Police scour neighborhoods to solve recent city shootings
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Pittsburgh police on Wednesday blitzed several city neighborhoods that have seen a surge of violence in recent days, seeking suspects, guns and information in their quest to put an end to the bloodshed.
With help from probation and parole officers, city police hit the homes of known gang members and their associates on the North Side and the Hilltop communities of Beltzhoover and Knoxville, where police believe some of the recent shootings have been retaliatory.
The killing of Dante Beasley, 22, late Tuesday outside his apartment on Rhine Place in Spring Hill was the fourth deadly shooting since Sunday morning, when 29-year-old Darius Grimsley was shot dead at Alpine and Garfield streets, also on the North Side.
The police efforts were part of the Pittsburgh Initiative to Reduce Crime, launched last year, which aims to eliminate gang and group-related homicides, in part through coordinated "responses" to such incidents. Police planned Wednesday's response in reaction to Mr. Grimsley's killing, but expanded it to include other homicides as the violence continued, Assistant Police Chief Maurita Bryant said.
The patrols did not yield any arrests in connection with the recent slayings, but officers did recover two rifles and a pair of shotguns from the home of two juveniles in Northview Heights. The police response was designed to send a message to offenders that their violence won't be tolerated, but Chief Bryant said noticeable results often take time. Police would have more success, she added, if they had cooperation from witnesses and community members who remain unwilling to come forward even as their safety is at stake.
"We're up against that street code of silence," she said. "We're trying to gather as much intel as we can get to the bottom of what the story is, what is driving this all of the sudden."
First Published August 18, 2011 12:00 am
