Milwaukee’s chief of police says the number of non-fatal shootings remains relatively high in his city, partly because some of those wounded are afraid to inform on their attacker.
Fatal shootings in Milwaukee are down by a third so far this year but the number of people wounded by gun shots is about the same as it was at this point in 2015.
In many of those cases, according to Milwaukee Police Chief Ed Flynn, the victim and shooter know each other, and the wounded person is afraid the individual with the gun will come back.
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“I’m sitting at the table in the conference room and one my commanders is saying, ‘OK, we had three shootings last night, and in two of them somebody was just walking down the street and felt the pain and they realized they’d been shot.’ I mean it’s totally bogus,” Flynn told several members of the Milwaukee Common Council on Monday.
In some cases, Flynn said, the victim may not trust the police enough to give them true story, which allows more shooters to stay on the street.
Flynn also addressed an uptick in the arrests of juveniles in Milwaukee , especially for car thefts and even the violent crime of carjacking. The trend comes amid calls by some politicians to close the Lincoln Hills School in Irma and place juvenile offenders in their home community due to allegations of abuse at youth prison. But Flynn advocates keeping the northern Wisconsin facility open.
“That’s a badly managed place that the state should manage better because there has to be a place to hold the truly dangerous,” he said. The FBI is looking into possible civil rights violations of inmates at Lincoln Hills. State officials say they are waiting for the results of that probe before proposing major changes.
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