Morningside Heights crime rates are 12% lower than the national average Violent crimes in Morningside Heights are 10% higher than the national average In Morningside Heights you have a 1 in 49 chance of becoming a victim of crime Morningside Heights is safer than 68% of the cities in New York Year over year crime in New York has increased by 5% He enters the small courtroom after everyone is present sometimes his uncle, always his aunt (taking notes in a scrupulous hand on a small legal pad). Police are offering a $2,500 reward for any information that may lead to the arrest of Majors' murderer. The victim was a Barnard student. In the spring of 2019, when Tess was still in high school, Barnard and Columbia undertook a massive rethinking of their approach to the issues of race and student safety after a Columbia senior named Alexander McNab refused to show his ID at the high Barnard gates. More. Columbia University President Lee Bollinger also released a statement, describing her attack Thursday as an "unthinkable tragedy." At sunset on December 15, Barnard and Columbia students flowed eastward to the steps in Morningside Park, some holding candles, for a vigil in Tesss memory. In the late 20th century, Morningside Park gained a reputation for high crime rates, and several groups devised plans to renovate the park. You didnt put the bake-sale table up, so its on you, is how she puts it. She remembers talking to her parents on the phone a few weeks after she arrived on campus. Will Biden Get Embarrassed in Iowa and New Hampshire? Their kids hear the word killer and wonder, What does that say about me?. By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy and to receive email correspondence from us. The murder of Tessa Majors occurred near Morningside Park in Morningside Heights, Manhattan, on December 11, 2019. Students of color said they were frequently targeted by campus police, leading to arbitrary stops and ID checks. Regarding Yesterday's Attack in Morningside Park How can we talk about crime without talking about all the reasons crime happens in the first place? asks Amari Gaiter, a junior who is a member of Columbias Women of Color Pre-Law Society, which produced an open letter to Beilock and Bollinger demanding fair process for any suspects. People could go do what they wanted to do. "They would prey on people. Columbia and Barnard hold programs in the school, but they are piecemeal. Barnard had already opened Cathedral Gardens, a swanky dorm with dishwashers, for 92 upperclass students on the parks southeastern corner, and condo high-rises sprouted like beanstalks on the periphery. You didnt want them to pick up a crack vial or a hypodermic needle. The park was neglected. Its stigmatizing young men and boys. The NYPD has stepped up its presence in the area in the meantime. Crime Statistics (Excel) Contact Information 520 West 126th Street New York, NY, 10027-2406 Precinct: (212) 678-1311 Community Affairs: (212) 678-1301 Crime Prevention: (212) 678-1330 - Ann Cardenas - E-mail: Ann.Cardenas@nypd.org Domestic Violence Prevention Officer: (212) 678-1342 - E-mail Youth Coordination Officer: (212) 678-1388 - E-mail Copyright 2023 NBCUniversal Media, LLC. This same boy, the one who was bitten (and who police say robbed another man at knifepoint that same week), then stabbed Tess with enough force that the youngest boy, who was standing apart, could see feathers shooting out of Tesss down jacket I think it was purple, he said. Columbia issued 28 "Clery Crime Alerts" so far in 2019, according to Columbia University's public safety website, but none warn students of the spree of assaults and robberies that occurred in Morningside Park this year. He was holding $6 in cash. In the daytime, you stayed on top of your kids, says one longtime Harlem homeowner. Tess yelled, loudly, Help me! She was disarmingly direct. He was arraigned in Manhattan family court later in the day. My friends and I were crying, we were pulling tissues out of our bag, and I heard someone say, Ooh, thats a good shot! Hecklers interrupted at every point. He also saw the child somewhat differently, as a juvenile charged with felony murder in the stabbing of Barnard student Tessa Majors. While any murder is shocking, one professor reflected, I was a little bit surprised at how shocking people found this one. There was a struggle. On abortion, Disney, and the presidents mortality, the long-shot presidential candidate seemed inclined to do almost anything to make headlines. A teenager who pleaded guilty to robbery in the fatal stabbing of Barnard College student Tessa Majors was sentenced on Monday to spend 18 months in a limited secure facility. She was a first-year, one of them. These preliminary hearings went on for weeks; their purpose was for Judge Carol Goldstein to make rulings on admission of evidence. She said that Morningside Park's risks were so well known in her circle of friends. Everything happened very quickly, within two or three minutes. By the third and fourth grade, the high-achieving kids at P.S. Morningside Crime Rates and Statistics - Niche He would also have seen Tesss body just a few dozen yards from his front door. "A lot of people got beat-up, jumped, killed in that park.". Tessa Majors was a freshman at Barnard College when she was stabbed in Morningside Park in what police say was a robbery. When Tess and all the other first-year students arrived on campus, no one mentioned the spike of crime in the park. Thirty skinny, overgrown, vertical acres, it forms a split-level boundary between the promontory where Columbia University and Barnard College stand, fortresslike, and the flats of Harlem, its elegant brownstones mixed with storefronts and public housing. Parents urged their daughters to come home as soon as they could They needed that, too, Paulette Arnold observes but the daughters were torn, because out in the regular world, no one could possibly understand what they were going through, the sense (which in some weird way was amazing) that everyone knew everyone elses thoughts, that you could spy another Barnard student crossing the street, lock eyes, and understand. Where do you draw that line? "There's a reasonable expectation that if theres a threat to students thats occurring near the campus, a timely warning is appropriate in the most serious of threats," Carter said, who has written about off-campus safety warnings. The teen suspect was charged as a juvenile with second-degree murder, armed robbery and criminal possession of a weapon with intent to use, according to a senior law enforcement official. Were asking anyone with info to contact @NYPDTips at #800577TIPS. Randall's Island tops the rest with 51 reports of major crimes. You have to be honest with me, he said, because this is very serious., The friends were a little older, both 14. So a new generation of college students thought the park was mostly safe because, mostly, it was. Subscribe Now! Additional reporting by Jen Chung and Christopher Robbins. Last nights murder of a young woman near Morningside Park is despicable, unacceptable and goes against everything NYC stands for. Source: The Morningside-Lenox Park, Atlanta, GA crime data displayed above is derived from the FBI's uniform crime reports for the year of 2020. And on Tuesday, a 16-year-old pleaded guilty to her murder in Manhattan Criminal Court and described at length the encounter that led to her violent death on a chilly December evening outside. New York May Become the First State to Ban Gas in New Buildings. Ramos-Luna asked what he was doing in the building, and the boy said he was visiting his cousin, Ramos-Luna testified. As of Dec. 8, there had been 20 robberies inside. If convicted, they will serve five years to life. I know that you would think its not as simple as punishing the teenagers who attempted to rob you and ultimately caused your death. But he has been frustrated by a perpetual lack of funds. Little by little, over about two hours, a story came out. ", Her family also thanked the "men and women of the NYPD, who continue to work diligently on this case.". He sometimes falls completely asleep, with his head on the table cupped in his arms, but more often he is doodling or writing or frequently talking to his lawyer, tapping her shoulder and whispering things behind a cupped hand as if he were telling secrets in school. Oh, he said, according to Ramos-Luna, these are the same sneakers. Back on the sidewalk, Ramos-Luna told his colleagues that he was going to arrest the boy for trespassing and bring him in for questioning. Riverdale Park. Around 1am on Wednesday February 8, a group of three men forced entry . The suspects in most instances were young teenagers and children just 12, 13, 14 years old often the same kids over and over. Thats not fair to the people who live in the neighborhood, and it gave the consent to be treated certain ways by the Police Department and by the community., This angelic-little-white-girl thing, its just too much, said Monica Dula, a Harlem resident and an attorney at the Legal Aid Society in the Bronx. More People Would Believe Me If I Screamed. That was unsayable at the time. In April, Bob Lederer, a middle-aged gay-rights activist, suffered a traumatic brain injury after being beaten by a group of young teenagers. She was a first-year college student who moved to the Big Apple from Virginia, according to the school. Theres so little unity or visionary leadership in Harlem, Metcalf says. Now her parents are preparing to bury the young woman, whom they and others have described as a generous soul with a brilliant future. Notification must be made "in a manner that is timely" and "will aid in the prevention of similar" crimes. And the paper, when she wrote it, was in the form of a letter to Tess on the subject of appropriate justice for the alleged perpetrators: What would justice look like in your case, Tess? They considered and discarded several targets before settling, finally, on Tess, a small 18-year-old with blue-green hair. Back to Full Profile. "It is their responsibility as an institution to not just tell them about the great things of this city, but to also talk to them about the possibility of dangers," Sekou added. It was something Ive never seen in Morningside Park. By Lisa Miller, who has been a writer on staff at New York since . Tessa Majors Murder Sparks New College Safety Measures at Morningside He did not touch her or take her belongings.. ", Last nights murder of a young woman near Morningside Park is despicable, unacceptable and goes against everything NYC stands for. The 20-year-old woman was found unresponsive when police responded to a 911 call late Friday. Luke's Hospital, police said. If you live in that area and youre young and in the park, youre violent. He called the boys uncle to come to the station, and Roosevelt Davis said he would be there when he got off work. The undertone is jungle drums.. And the new undergraduates who are drawn to the two schools arrive with the understanding, cultivated in the long shadow of the Central Park Five and the time of Black Lives Matter, that references to muggings, thugs, and gangs are racial stereotyping and not okay. Fearless, said someone who had known her for a very long time. Repeatedly, she asked Acevedo about a long list of civilian complaints alleged against him: entering homes without probable cause or a warrant, aggressive language and profanity, withholding evidence, excessive use of force. Park Where College Freshman Was Killed Is No. 1 in Robberies: NYPD In the days ahead, please know that all of our campus resources are available for you as we mourn this heartbreaking loss together. 180 has changed, too; it is now that precious commodity, a hot public school. "We are thankful for the incredible outpouring of love and support we have received from across the country. She was very special and very loved.". There was this rush to pick up young black boys. He wears a dark winter coat with a gray stripe on the hood that says Calvin Klein, and he keeps it on for hours, even when the courtroom gets stifling, until finally he removes it and then you can see what hes wearing often a baseball shirt, white with blue sleeves. Haynes believes that only a child whos too eager to please would do such a thing. Patrols ramped up in Morningside Park after fatal stabbing - NY1 A Student Was Murdered Near Columbia. What Should the University Do In a statement, Barnard said they sent an emergency text notification alert "to all registered students, faculty, and staff about police investigating a robbery/stabbing inside Morningside Park. a driveway near Ferncroft Drive and Woodland Park Road on Wednesday, April 26 at around 1 a.m. . All the cops were the citys answer to an unasked question: What are you going to do to protect us from the natives?, as he put it to me. We got calls that the police were going to peoples homes, knocking on doors, intimidating them., The language used by police and the press to describe the suspects was concerning, too. At home, the boy walked the dog and watched videos on YouTube. Morningside Park stabbings: Columbia student killed, tourist wounded in It has a lot of empty seats, making it a convenient place for the Department of Education to dump troubled kids with nowhere to go. Kopyto, Majors's fellow Barnard first-year, is from New York. A law enforcement source said a witness saw a group of people running from where her body was found. I didnt raise you to be like this., When it was all over, Davis had to explain to his nephew that he was being taken into custody until the trial. Looking back at the brawls, thrills, and temporary insanity of the 90s feud between the New York Knicks and the Miami Heat. Metcalf was furious that a police car was suddenly parked outside the school every day and at the implication that somehow the school culture was to blame. For the fifth time, Judge Goldstein denied the boys parole. 180, the parents were reeling. The 18-year-old fought off her attackers as best she could, biting one of . In 2015, it introduced a Spanish-language-immersion program, attracting the fashion designers, educators, salespeople, and genomics experts who had recently moved to Harlem. They approached Tess and asked for her stuff, the boy said. ", When asked why she wanted to attend Barnard, Majors told the women's liberal arts college in her application: As an avid feminist, I have striven towards bridging my community gender divide by being outspoken in my classes, taking an intensive course on social justice, and campaigning for a congressional candidate. Not probably again. Soon after, the group ran out of the park as Majors stumbled up the stairs in a desperate attempt to get help. (Tess apparently did have a bag of marijuana in her pocket when she encountered the boys, but the altercation was not part of a drug deal.) They werent disinvited. He looks like Tess, except his face is rounder and bleak. Police are still trying to identify all of the attackers allegedly involved in the fatal incident. The uncle responded with disbelief and something like fury. NYC crime: 1 dead, 1 wounded in random stabbings in Morningside Heights Coney Island closely follows with 49 and No. He peered down at the phone, then stepped away, picked up his leg and regarded his own foot. Im so concerned that they are going to use this as an opportunity to just fuck with young black people and Latino people all day and all night., At the same time, everyone is trying to wrap their heads around what happened. A campuswide text that went out to students and staff late Wednesday said one male suspect may have been wearing a green jacket and a mask. He sits in the corner farthest from the boy, near the door, on a hard, narrow, uncomfortable bench. In an email to students, the school said that she was "just beginning her journey at Barnard and in life. Among the woke majority, theres a dismissive attitude about proactive safety. The McNab incident was handled badly, Hughes agrees, but safety actually matters. A running list of all the alleged personal slights and rude behavior that may hamper Ron DeSantis in his 2024 primary battle with Donald Trump. We will keep this community safe, arrest the perpetrators and ensure nothing like this can happen again., Then, in a radio interview, Ed Mullins, the head of the Sergeants Benevolent Association, alleged that Tess had been in the park buying pot, blaming the murder on hands-off policing. Although crime has since plummeted to historic lows in the 30 years since, Morningside Park's notoriety as a dangerous place is hardly a thing of the past. "Juveniles anywhere from 14 to 16 years of age arrested in that pattern," Shea said. Andrew Lichtenstein/Corbis . That's because the parkwhich is across the street from Columbia property, sits between Columbia and a Barnard student dormitory on 110th Street, and is used by students to get to Columbia from off-campus apartments in Harlem or from the 116th subway stationis not considered a "Clery location.". "That's part of the challenge incorporating public property into the reporting requirements at all. Suspect wanted in stalking case shot and injured by Placentia police in The college freshman, an aspiring writer, played in a band and she recently had her first show in October, according to her Instagram posts. *Sorry, there was a problem signing you up. The boy was getting good grades outstanding, in fact, in science, creative writing, and art. Terms of Service apply. Crime statistics show more robberies have been reported in Morningside Park this year than any other city park. Columbia University's public safety website. He said he already knew what the boy had done and would be able to tell if he was lying. They asked if I felt safe walking through New York, and I was like, Oh, yeah, I feel totally safe. And my dad was like, Its good that you feel safe, but dont be nave.. A mandatory safety briefing was part of their orientation, they say, but it was worthless. That its about looking at the whole system and asking why those teenagers were robbing people in the first place. Paths on the upper level were narrow and overgrown, their sight lines obscure. The first text came at around 8:30 p.m. Barnard Public Safety Police are investigating a robbery/stabbing inside Morningside Park, it said. The first-year student was walking through Morningside Park when she was stabbed in an apparent robbery. This was weird, but not too weird. But in part because of the rate of neighborhood change, the middle school at P.S. But the intervening years had inverted the optics, as well as the emotional and political response. I was told not to walk through that park," Melony said. I enjoy taking difficult classes and feel invigorated when forced outside of my intellectual comfort zone. Harlem residents Calvin Hunt and his son, Cameron, outside a court where one of the accused appeared. The boy is escorted in by an officer with a gun, his hands cuffed behind his back. But soon rumors began to travel. With both cases, Hughes believes public safety has been collateral damage in the effort to expunge racism. Morningside Park is located across the street from the university's "Faculty House." Its recommendations were for the college to better codify its mission: to train officers, to articulate policies, to collaborate better with Columbia security, to be more transparent with Barnard students, and to conduct an independent and comprehensive physical security assessment of the Barnard campus., Paulette Arnold and five other students wrote as much in a letter to President Beilock two nights after Tesss death. Scores of young women and men carrying flowers began flowing into the school shorty after 6 p.m. President [Lee] Bollinger and I are committed to doing everything we can to reinstill a sense of safety for all of us in our community, Barnards president, Sian Beilock, told mourners. According to the Times, there had been 20 robberies inside Morningside Park or on its perimeter as of December 8th of this year, compared to seven in the same period last year. From todays vantage point, I can see that this was racial code, but then I thought, Okay., Over the decades, the city got safer and the neighborhood did too. Banks of blinding lights, powered by generators and with enough wattage to illuminate a night baseball game, were rolled into the park and stationed at previously dim intersections. He would come back when he could, he promised: As soon as they call me, Ill be here.. Still, Kopyto said, she could see how someone "who was from out of town, or who was out-of-the-loop," would not know. You cant walk there. New information in the investigation showed that 18-year-old Tessa Majors was in Morningside Park just before 7 p.m. Wednesday when she was a victim of a "robbery gone wrong," according to police. Did it learn from that mistake? The Democrat and Chronicle, citing US Department of Education data, reported that the Morningside Heights campus of 31,000 logged a 45 percent spike in crime in 2019, to 83 from 57 incidents.. Suspect is a male wearing a green jacket and a mask. Just because the kids come from terrible circumstances doesnt mean they dont sometimes have knives in their pockets, and people will do intellectual gymnastics to avoid confronting that paradox.. Sasha Hochman met Tess on the fourth night of school when they went out with a big group of first-years into the city, and while they never became close friends, Sasha liked seeing Tess in the elevator or the cafeteria. That was obvious., Anna Quindlen remembers arriving at Barnard in 1970 and being told, at part of freshman orientation, that should she accidentally miss the subway stop at the front door of campus, she should stay in the station, turn right around, and take the subway back downtown and never try to walk home through the park or Harlem itself. Im asking questions I already know the answers to. The stabbings, on opposite ends of Morningside Park, were certain to rattle the Columbia University community that populates Morningside Heights. The three boys were in the park to rob people. Tessa Majors killing: Teen charged as juvenile sentenced to 18 months