Peter Hoagland: “I rise to strongly urge passage of this comprehensive crime bill as soon as possible. Violence is on the rise across…”

“I rise to strongly urge passage of this comprehensive crime bill as soon as possible. Violence is on the rise across this country and the battle against it will take nothing short of a historic response from this Congress. Imagine, if my colleagues will, a country where more than 23,000 people died violent deaths in 1992. Imagine a country where gunfire is a daily occurrence in many neighborhoods and where it is not safe to walk to the grocery store or run some other simple errand after dark. Imagine a nation where a woman is raped every 47 seconds and where gunfire could soon overtake car accidents as one of the leading causes of death of young people. That country is not Bosnia, or Somalia--that country is the United States of America. In eastern Nebraska, we have seen an alarming rise in the number of violent crimes. Just last month, a 94-year-old woman was brutally attacked and robbed as she walked home from the neighborhood drug store in an area that one would normally consider safe. What are we coming too? One of the most troubling things about rising violence is that the character of crime is changing.”