OPINION:
The news of a mass shooting Saturday evening in the nation’s capital was heard around the world.
Police were cordoning off streets and knocking on doors to determine who knew what and when.
The gunfire was contained to a Northwest D.C. neighborhood, but the volume of the bloodletting and the reaction from the Metropolitan Police Department set the stage for broad coverage.
Gunmen in a Honda sedan are suspected of spraying a group of people near Seventh and Longfellow streets, killing three people and wounding three others.
That’s the human toll, which helps explain why Fox News, NBC New York and other news outlets posted coverage.
“D.C. police tweeted a photo of a black Honda Accord that the department said was connected to the shooting,” MSN News quoted Fox as reporting. “A $75,000 reward was offered for tips leading to an arrest.”
Rewards offered for suspects’ identification, apprehensions and/or convictions in brazen crimes are part of crime-solvers’ investigative tool chests.
While some of the rewards are as low as $1,000, some are as high as $50,000 for a single killing — including a fatal hit-and-run in August in Los Angeles. The victim was a 91-year-old pedestrian.
Also in D.C., rewards as high as $25,000 were offered in the shooting deaths of several boys and girls.
The rewards are a far reversal of misfortunates when “snitching” was frowned upon two to three decades ago and the de rigueur of police reform today is defunding law enforcement agencies.
Offering rewards is but one tool police and prosecutors can use to get killers and illegal guns off the streets after lives are lost. Another is prevention.
Are police and prosecutors on the same page?
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