er of the crime wave that has this
city of 77,000 on pace to double
its homicides in just three years,
and has already shattered a nearly
20-year record for killings. With
64 homicides so far this year, the
murder rate is on par with levels
seen in Haiti in the chaotic aftermath of the 2010 earthquake.
“A bullet has no name. If somebody shoots and I’m walking, I
could be hit,” Johnson says.
“People are afraid right now. You
can see it in their faces.”
The crime surge coincides with
new census data identifying Camden, long battered by vanishing industry, as the most impoverished
city in the U.S., with 42 percent of
residents under the poverty line,
and an average family income of
$21,191. If trends persist, Camden may soon hold the grim title
of both the country’s poorest and
most dangerous city.
As residents decry the violence,
local leaders are readying a radical
plan that they call the only practical solution at hand to calm the
streets: the dismantling of the
Camden Police Department and the
outsourcing of policing to a new,
cheaper force run by the county
Rows of
rundown,
abandoned
buildings and
houses in
Camden.