ABSTRACT
As research topics in criminology go, murder is a tough one. It occurs with some frequency but little regularity, making it difficult to predict where and when it will take place. Murder scenes are often ‘closed’ to outside view as the integrity of evidence at the scene could be compromised, especially as forensic techniques become more capable of detecting minute traces. The problem for researchers is to find a ready supply of suspicious deaths and a receptive gatekeeper. As the excerpt from the Washington Post article presented below suggests, in some cities, at least the first part of this requirement is fulfilled. This chapter reflects on a study of homicide detectives working in a small corner or ‘District’ of the US capital where murder is a regular occurrence. With around 500 deaths per year across the city, mostly in the African-American ghettos, this was a ‘land of the dead’, cynically dubbed ‘the killing fields’ by the homicide squad detectives:
A night and early morning of gunfire in the area left five people dead and four wounded, including a teenage student found shot to death in a stolen car. Shortly before 11 pm Saturday, District police were called to the first crime scene. Officers found a car that had crashed into a tree. Inside officers found a girl, 16, collapsed in the front passenger seat. Minutes after arriving at the first scene police found two male teenagers in an adjoining parking lot. One youth, 15, had been shot in the leg and arm, the other, 18, had been shot in the leg. In a shooting a mile away that District police thought might be related, officers were called about a half-hour later and found a man who had been shot in the leg.
The violence continued about 2.30 am when police were called to investigate a shooting about five miles from the previous one. There, officers found one man dead with at least one gunshot wound to the upper body. Police said they found a second man who had been shot in the shoulder. About 5.20 am near the District line, police responded to a call about a shooting. Two men were found collapsed inside of a Jeep Wrangler. The driver and passenger were struck by gunfire, officers said, apparently as they travelled along the street, causing the vehicle to go out of control, hit a car and stop on a sidewalk. The driver was pronounced dead at the scene and the passenger died at a hospital. Officers were called at 7.30 am to investigate gunfire. In the back of a vehicle, they found a man who had been shot. He was pronounced dead at the scene, authorities said. A police spokeswoman said investigators knew of no suspects or motives in the shootings. She said police are investigating possible links among the shootings. (Clarence Williams and David. S. Fallis, Washington Post staff writers, Monday 27 September 2004, pp. B1–B2, abridged)
