An email from Police Chief William Anderson about law enforcement downtown drew harsh response from some City Council members during a special session Monday concerning, in part, the search for his replacement.
Anderson called on city officials to “address this dangerous situation” after another fight involving a gun broke out on Fifth Street on Thursday. The email, sent on Friday, provided details about the fight, which started beside Michelangelo’s Pizza at 200 E. Fifth St.
Anderson said that officers from Alcoholic Beverage Control, Alcohol Law Enforcement and the Greenville Police Department responded to the fight after 20-year-old Equan Bowden of Goldsboro pulled out a .25 automatic handgun and pointed it at the victim before racking the slide of the gun and ejecting a live round onto the ground. Anderson said officers don’t know if Bowden attempted to shoot the victim and had a misfire or if he racked the slide for intimidation.
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Comments
I hope that some day that the
I hope that some day that the other parts of Greenville will get 10% of the attention shown the downtown bar scene. The bar owners have the police and the council at their beck and call! Pretty stupid when you look at the resources spent on protecting the drunks.
Downtown
There are a few of us who have a perspective of downtown which spans many years. Firstly, the crowds downtown were larger in the 60's and 70's because the drinking age(18) was younger. Walking on the sidewalk was virtually impossible. The inability of the Police Department to stop the violence there now has nothing to do with bar proximity to ECU. You see no one carried a gun back then. Just like no one flew on a plane and had a gun in his pocket then either. Today they do. We eliminated weapons from airplanes with metal detectors. If it is agreed that loitering is not permitted downtown and one must be waiting to get into an establishment then there lies the solution. If the young man who pulled the gun downtown knew he was going to have to go through a metal detector to get into a bar I doubt if he would have been carrying a weapon. This would mean that all the bars would have to have metal detectors. It's worked for our schools and aviation. It sure beats the lame idea of buying all the bars and bulldozing them.
he wasn't in a bar
and what makes you think he even went close to a bar
Jack's Negative Vibes
Tell me Jack, did you write the police report TOO? The young man who was toting the gun last week had to go somewhere down there. You need to go downtown and just stand around and see how long it takes before you are scooped up, searched, and hawled away. If you don't believe me, just ask the citycouncil woman named " Kandie" who was tying her shoe. Only the FEAR of getting caught carrying a concealed weapon is going to stop thugs from going there armed. For the record: Several of those bars do a $ million a year in revenue.
The Mayor is Right
I'm a former ECU student from almost 20 years ago. We did not have the streets blocked off, nor did the police allow people to gather in the street as they do today. Traffic continued to flow down 5th St., Cotanche St., etc. As students the only thing we had to worry about was the occasional fist-a-cuffs from a drunk buddy running off his mouth. We stood in lines waiting outside The Elbow, Bogies, or Corrigans on the sidewalk as traffic passed by. The problem today is the youth of today. They have no respect for authority and always complain of unfairness. So our police and government coddle to their wants, all the while they pay no taxes(yet). They let them gather in the streets mingling between club goers and loiterers. Common sense says that's stupid. Take it back to the way it used to be. Let the folks that want to spend their money at the bars stand in line orderly. The riff-raff that loiters on the street corner should be dispersed just like they did while I was in school. Make them feel uncomfortable. DO NOT CODDLE THEM!! The folks that pay taxes should have priority in what goes on in this town, period.
The Chief of Police email
Let me get this straight. Three weeks before his departure the Chief emails the City Manager about the problem of crime in Greenville. The Council doesn't like his attitude? What's to like? The Chief is moving someplace to his liking. The Council complains about the Chief. So what? Who cares? An old sage used to say, "If you wants to look impotent, you gots to act impotent." Thanks, Daily Reflector, for this snapshot of Greenville City government.
to Rogers
Have you ever seen wine made
it is not pretty , but it needs to be done
so I suggest you take YOUR attitude and travel with the Chief to Asheville
Greenville will be better off without both of you
Rose is no rose...
Rose glover remainds me of Aunt Ester on Sanford & Son...a real black eye for the AmericanAfrican community
Anderson is totally UN Professional
BARS being close to ECU is irrelevent
THIS City Council has not had enough time to do anything YET with the mess Dunn left with the downtown area
What happen is that Bowers and Anderson had a little country club thing going with the these two incompetents throwing money around left and right.
And Dunn doing nothing
Downtown needs some renovation- read demolition- of the Phoenix and some of those places- but it is still viable and is not a powder keg
what a fool and non professional Anderson is!!!
Ha ha
Terry Boardman, ladies and gentlemen! Lets give him a hand! Irrational and irate as ever!
nick
you have not said an inteligent thing in this forumn yet
why start now?
Fact Check
Exactly how would you as a City Council, Mayor or City Manager demolish places of business? Invoke what rule of law? Your trolling blogs on stories like this are laughable. Hell you even got the police statisticians fired up questioning their numbers. What a waste of time and energy as that doesn't resolve anything. Try and be a little more creative and come up with...........never mind.....just keep posting these as they do have entertainment value!
Cynthia- you ignorant soul
You buy the places and tear them down!!!
Instead of wasting $750,000 on some stupid signs
Tell it like it is!
Ha! One of the few positive things that Anderson has done was write this email. Anderson called it the way it is..You bet downtown is a powderkeg and there will be another homicide there in the future as more police presence does not stop someone from bringing a gun downtown and when they get drunk use it in a fight (perfect example of what Anderson is describing). The problem is the BARS are so close to ECU!!
City council is at fault because they protect the bars downtown. This is still going to be another era of a pro-business City Council.
Trying to be politically correct is sickening yet that is what we have in this city government. The days of speaking the truth and whats on your mind are gone. Pretty sad as we the citizens pay the price.
Bars and ECU
I find it funny all of you claiming that the bars location being close to ECU is the problem. You do realize that having them father away would just generate yet more problems (ever heard of drunk driving). Those that attend ECU that want to go to a bar are going to go to a bar. They are not going to sit in their dorm and think "man if only there was a bar a little closer to campus". You close all the bars in Greenville and I can already tell you what will happen. A rise in drunk driving and a rise in on campus parties featuring alcohol.
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