Ariz. border towns say violent crime rates are low [View All]

Source: Sierra Vista Herald

Assistant Police Chief Roy Bermudez shakes his head and smiles when he hears politicians and pundits declaring that Mexican cartel violence is overrunning his Arizona border town. “We have not, thank God, witnessed any spillover violence from Mexico,” Bermudez says emphatically. “You can look at the crime stats. I think Nogales, Ariz., is one of the safest places to live in all of America.”

Congressional members, including Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., and John Shadegg, R-Ariz., sent President Barack Obama a letter asking that National Guard soldiers be sent to the border because “violence in the vicinity of the U.S. Mexico border continues to increase at an alarming rate.”

And last month, as she signed Arizona’s tough new law cracking down on illegal immigrants, Gov. Jan Brewer also called for National Guard troops. The law makes it a state crime to be in Arizona illegally and requires authorities to check documents of people they reasonably suspect to be illegal. Brewer said she signed it to solve what she said is an Arizona “crisis” caused by “border-related violence and crime due to illegal immigration.”

Clarence Dupnik, the sheriff of Pima County, said there always has been crime associated with smuggling in southern Arizona, but today’s rhetoric does not seem to jibe with reality. “This is a media-created event,” Dupnik said. “I hear politicians on TV saying the border has gotten worse. Well, the fact of the matter is that the border has never been more secure.” Cochise County’s crime rate has been “flat” for at least 10 years, the sheriff added. Even in 2000, when record numbers of undocumented immigrants were detained in the area, just 4 percent of the area’s violent crimes were committed by illegal aliens.

Read more: http://www.svherald.com/content/2010/05/08/ariz-border-towns-say-violent-crime-rates-are-low

---

If crime in Arizona, and the border area in particular, is down and "illegal immigrants" are committing so little of it, who's stoking the fear? And is it for political purposes or genuine fear of "others"?