All quiet on the murder front

A reporter who covers cops and courts here made an interesting observation. There hasn’t been a new murder case in the Valley in a long time.

This may seem wrong because there have been numerous stories about murder cases recently, but the crimes took place months ago, if not more than a year.

One case, the infamous machete killing in Palmer is in the Anchorage court for events that took place there, but the killing here took place more than a year ago.

Even though a murder took place up in the Sheldon Road area last summer, it never went to court because the shooter committed suicide.

The same as the woman who was shot by police just recently and another man, also killed by police never went to court.

This is to say, for all the growth in the Valley and the evils that come with it — drugs mostly — hasn’t led to a proportionate number of murders lately.

Perhaps, as some police officials have said, crimes of all kinds have lows and highs and maybe these past several months have been one of the lows when it comes to civilians killing each on purpose.

Judging from numbers that only go back to 2007, the Death Penalty Information Center shows Alaska had 6.4 murders per 100,000 population that year. Using that number and estimating the borough population at 80,000, we should have just over five per year. It seems like we have more than that, but last year we had one. According to the statistics, with the year nearly a quarter over, we should have had one murder already this year. That hasn’t happened.

Not so in Anchorage. Using the same statistic and a rough population of 300,000, they should have about 19 per year. With three months almost gone, they’ve had six murders, well on their way to 24 for the year.

Unfortunately the Valley has had more snowboarder deaths than murders this year.

Should we count our blessings? Yes. Should we be worried that the averages will catch up with us? Probably. But for now, we should enjoy the fact that nobody’s shot, stabbed or strangled another citizen in quite some time.

From murder, it’s an easy segue to the Legislature’s look at re-instituting the death penalty.

That fellow mentioned above who is on trial in Anchorage — machete wielding Erin Rogers Jr. — would be a prime candidate. In a rage he hacked is father to death, and danged near did the same to his father’s fiancee. He is also accused of killing a college student in Anchorage and shooting two other people. Police say he admitted he wanted to kill as many cops as possible, but his gun jammed.

Instead, we’ll feed and house him — a young man who will never see the light of day — and give him medical treatment for as long as he lives.