True Story: The Mugging of My Wife 

We lived on 15th and Corcoran, a pretty safe neighborhood, but a block from 14th Avenue, which was the dividing line between the White population and the Black population and also a street on which hookers were still standing on corners in the early morning.

The story I want to tell you is this: We had just picked up our toddler from his daytime nanny’s house and parked our car a half-block from our place. K started to fold up his stroller while I carried him to the house. She did not join me at the front door a minute later, as I expected, so I walked back to the car and found her sprawled out on the sidewalk. Someone had mugged her – had taken not just her money but her wedding ring.

“He had a gun,” she said.

I asked her what he looked like and which way he went. Then I got in our little Honda Civic and drove in that direction. As I approached 14th, I saw a man who matched her description sitting on a bench. I stopped the car and rolled down my window. Foolhardy, I know, but I was hoping to talk him into giving me the ring.

“Hey,” I called.

He looked up, put his hand into the pocket of his raincoat and stared menacingly at me.

So I kept driving, knowing that there was often a cop car parked at the next corner since it was just a block from a local donut shop. (I’m not making that up.)

Sure enough, the car was there, with two cops inside drinking coffee and eating donuts. I walked over to the driver’s side and tapped on the window. The officer at the wheel obliged me and rolled it down.

“What?” he said.

“My wife just got robbed at gunpoint,” I said. “And the guy that robbed her is sitting on a bench right back there.” (I pointed.)

The officer looked at me for a second, then looked back at his half-eaten donut.

“Dial 911,” he said, and rolled his window back up.

That’s my story.

Now, here’s that article by James Freeman in the WSJ…

Trump’s Not the Only One Seeing an Emergency in DC
By James Freeman 

Media folk still can’t resist rebutting the president when they should be covering him.

Now he’s got them pretending DC is safe. Even months into Donald Trump’s second term as US president, too many media folk still feel compelled to oppose him rather than report on him. One must either laugh or cry at the results as various Washingtonians in the press corps turn down yet another opportunity to practice journalism.

Kristine Parks reports for Fox News: MSNBC host Joe Scarborough suggested that some liberal media figures blasting President Donald Trump’s federal takeover of Washington, DC, were not being entirely honest about their concerns over crime in the nation’s capital, on Tuesday’s “Morning Joe.”

Scarborough said he found it “interesting” that some reporters critically covering the Trump takeover have privately expressed concerns about their own safety.

“This is interesting,” Scarborough said. “I actually heard from a reporter when this happened, going, ‘Well, you know, if he doesn’t overreach, this could actually be a good thing for quality of life,’ etc., because in DC right now, I had this happen to my family and I had that, and they go down the list. And then I saw him tweet something completely different.”

The Journal’s Faith Bottum notes: There’s no doubt that Washington is terribly run. Its most recent peak of violence, in 2023, saw the overall crime rate climb to more than double the national average, with the violent crime rate more than three times as high. It had the fifth-highest murder rate among big US cities and the highest rate of car theft.

But since the elected official currently calling attention to violence in DC is Donald J. Trump, the media urge to issue “fact checks” of factual comments has again proved irresistible.

David Klepper of the Associated Press writes: TRUMP: “The murder rate in Washington today is higher than that of Bogota, Colombia, and Mexico City. Some of the places that you hear about as being the worst places on Earth, much higher. This is much higher.”

THE FACTS: It’s true, but Trump isn’t telling the whole story. Washington does have a higher homicide rate than many other global cities, including some that have historically been considered unsafe by many Americans. But Trump is leaving out important context: the US in general sees higher violent crime rates than many other countries.

While Washington is one of America’s most dangerous big cities, others have higher crime rates.

On X, crypto investor Nic Carter satirizes the AP report: “It’s true, but it needs more context. The context is that we don’t like that particular fact.” Thanks for this fact check AP. Excellent work.

Also on X, New York Times correspondent Peter Baker opined this week: Citing a nonexistent crime crisis, Trump plans to take over the Washington DC police and put troops in the streets of the nation’s capital.

Fox’s Brit Hume responded: If the crime crisis is nonexistent, why is the city under an overnight curfew for kids 17 and under?

The website of Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department helpfully notes the recent history that occurred prior to this week’s media-enraging Trump press conference:

The Juvenile Curfew Emergency Amendment Act of 2025 took effect on July 7, 2025. An 11:00 p.m. curfew is now in effect citywide every night for all persons age 17 and under through August 31, 2025…
 
The Juvenile Curfew Emergency Amendment Act of 2025 states that persons age 17 or younger cannot remain in any public place or on the premises of any establishment within the District of Columbia during curfew hours, unless they are involved in certain exempted activities.

The law gives the Chief of Police the authority to establish Extended Juvenile Curfew Zones and allows the Mayor of the District of Columbia to authorize an Emergency Juvenile Curfew.

A press release from the DC government noted in June: Today, Mayor Muriel Bowser, working with Ward 2 Councilmember and Chairwoman of the Committee on the Judiciary and Public Safety Brooke Pinto, announced the Juvenile Curfew Emergency Amendment Act of 2025, emergency legislation to strengthen and enhance enforcement and accountability tools for juveniles, with a specific focus on a stronger and more flexible curfew program.

“Most of our young people are doing the right thing, but unfortunately, we continue to see troubling trends in how groups of young people are gathering in the community – in ways that too often lead to violence and other unlawful behaviors,” said Mayor Bowser. 

“And when we see patterns of unsafe or unlawful behavior that put young people and the community at risk, we have to act. This emergency legislation gives us stronger, more flexible tools to prevent violence and disorder before it starts and to keep our community safe.”

A May press release from the mayor’s office had described the effort to update the city’s curfew law and noted “recent disturbances involving juveniles in commercial areas across the District.” The release continued:

“We want our young people to be able to socialize safely and appropriately. But we are seeing some very concerning trends and concerning behaviors, and these changes in behavior require changes to our public safety posture,” said Mayor Bowser.