Killings Shake Chicago Neighborhood

C H I C A G O, July 17, 2000 -- When some activists on the far South Side lookedaround their neighborhood last fall, they saw a recipe for death.

A serial killer was preying upon women in a nearby neighborhoodand the conditions in Greater Roseland were frighteningly similar:drugs, prostitution, abandoned buildings, weed-choked lots.

“We looked at Roseland and said to ourselves, ‘We are sittinghere on a powder keg,’” said Michael Evans, an associate directorwith the church-based Developing Communities Project.

Their morbid prediction came true. The first body was pulledfrom one of Greater Roseland’s abandoned buildings in mid-May andfive more have been found in the two months since.

“Now, the most horrendous things that could have happened havetaken place,” Evans said.

A Serial Killer on the Loose?

The slayings mirror those around the Englewood neighborhood inthe 1990s: The victims were all black women found in abandonedbuildings, and most were involved with prostitution or drugs, orboth.

Police believe the Englewood killings may have been committed bythree separate people, all since arrested. The possibility of aserial killer in Greater Roseland has not been ruled out.

While residents absorb that prospect, they have tried to prodthe city into doing something about conditions they believegenerate crime in their neighborhood.

“Look there,” Evans said during a tour of the neighborhoodlast week. “Abandoned house, vacant lot, someone lives there,vacant lot, vacant lot, someone lives there, abandoned house.”

The abandoned buildings are “invitations to all kinds ofdangerous stuff for neighborhoods,” according to George Kelling, aprofessor at Rutgers University’s School of Criminal Justice.

Kelling was one of the original proponents of the so-called“broken windows” theory of neighborhood crime — the notion thatcleaning up disorder and signs of crime, such as graffiti andbroken windows, actually helps prevent serious crime.

“Residents intuitively know that [abandoned buildings] are thekinds of settings that invite predators,” he said. “Now publicofficials have finally gotten the message that residents’complaints are more than about tidiness but are at the root of someserious problems.”

A Neighborhood of Contrasts

Greater Roseland, about 12 miles south of the city’s gleamingskyscrapers, is a neighborhood of stark contrasts. Families raisetheir children in well-kept homes across the street from suspecteddrug houses. New housing is just down the road from whereprostitutes walk the streets.

The neighborhood has the highest foreclosure rate in the city,attributable to a number of factors including predatory lendingpractices; the death of older homeowners; and absentee landlordsand owners.

Chicago Building Commissioner Mary Richardson-Lowry estimatesthat 90 percent of the owners of the abandoned buildings liveoutside the area.

The city in April passed a measure that requires owners toregister vacant structures and obtain liability insurance, or facefines.

Owners are encouraged to rehabilitate but the city will pursuedemolition in court if deemed necessary, Richardson-Lowry said.Still, the city is relatively powerless if an owner boards up abuilding and is in no other way delinquent, she said.

“The difficulty is that many of the owners board it and don’tgo back to those buildings for some time,” she said. “That in andof itself is not unusual.”

Drugs Used as a Lure?

Evans shook his head in disbelief during a visit to thetwo-story home where the body of a 32-year-old woman was found May17. The first-floor windows were boarded up, but a basemententrance was wide open.

“What we’ve seen here is a situation that in all respects couldhave been avoided or at least minimized,” he said.

Police believe drugs were used in the killings in bothneighborhoods to lure women into the abandoned buildings. They arewarning women with high-risk life styles to be cautious, and haveassigned an officer whose sole duty is to check on vacantstructures.

Geoffrey Griffin, 29, has been charged with murder in the May 12death of Angela Jones, 29. Police are awaiting the results of DNAtests to determine if he is linked to the others.

Lula Kidd, 62, a retiree who has lived in Roseland for 28 years,takes care of the vacant lot next door, making sure the grass andweeds are mowed and no one loiters too long. She plans to stick itout.

“This is my home. My husband and I moved here with four smallkids and we struggled,” she said.