"Gypsies, tramps and thieves......."
Happily the one comment which appeared with the article is the positve one which follows. Please be sure to read the comment.
MORGAN
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FROM DEERFIELD PATCH
http://deerfield.patch.com/articles/gypsy-scams-hit-deerfield#c
Gypsy Scam Artists Hit Deerfield
Police say elderly man scammed out of $2,200.
Article and Photo By Natalie Kaplan
May 13 2O11
Police are warning local residents to watch out for scam artists possibly targeting the Deerfield community.
According to Commander of Investigations Walter Trillhaase an elderly Deerfield man was conned out of thousands of dollars earlier this week.
“They’re bad people picking on the older folks,” Trillhaase explained.
A local victim told authorities he was approached in front of his home by a group of individuals who offered to clean the markings off his garage floor for $22. However, when the work was completed the suspects demanded $2,200. Authorities say the resident felt pressured into writing the check, which was quickly cashed by the thieves.
Officials tell Patch this is the second incident they’ve dealt with in the past 12 months and that some of the scam artists cruise communities like Deerfield searching for elderly people outside their homes.
Police say spring and summer are active times for scams that commonly include home repair fraud and ruse entry burglary.
“It’s not something we can sit and wait for,” Trillhaase said which is why Deerfield Police have been handing out flyers to alert residents about the situation.
In that flyer it explains that "the appearance of a Gypsy can be generally described as medium to dark complexioned Caucasian, who are often mistaken as Hispanic."
Patrols are also being increased in residential neighborhoods.
They are encouraging residents not to allow unknown individuals perform work on their residences before checking that person’s reputation. Authorities also warn residents not to allow anyone into their homes or let them roam their property.
The flyer also notes that there are other transient criminals who do similar types of cons and this information about Gypsies only deals with self-proclaimed Gypsies who have elected to live the criminal lifestyle.
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THE FOLLOWING IS A GREAT COMMENT
Heather Ureche
11:24am on Saturday, May 14, 2011
I assume that the Police or someone in some authority has established that these people are in fact what you have decribed as Gypsies? I wonder if it was really vital to the report to sugsest the ethnicity of the person concered? Also had they been from let us say the Jewish communitty would the headline then have read "Jewish" Scams Hit Deerfield ? or "Asian" Scams Hit Deerfield ? or "Mexican" Scams Hit Deerfield? No I thought not; why then Gypsy? They may or may not have be Gypsies. Whoever they are what they are doing is not right or acceptable however by using the word Gypsy in this way is both racist and provocative it is alsp un fair on the many thousands of good hardworking and law abiding Romani people in the USA who already face daily prejudice and stigmatisation simply on the basis of their racial origin, reports such as this one just compounds the problem by reinforcing stereotypes.
Heather Ureche. UK.
4 comments:
Yes, great comment by Heather from the U.K.
I know. The comment was a great response to that irresponsible article.
Thanks SP
Morgan
First of all, before posting a response, you should make yourself a little more credible with the simple use of spell check. Secondly, I think it would be fair to say "Mexican Scam Artists" would be a possible headline in a newspaper. However, these scam artists just happened to be Gypsies. There are scam artists of every ethnicity, but this was not the purpose of the article. Instead of reading into every detail to try to find some sort of scandal in the news, how about you pay attention to the real problem. Let's not hound our criminal justice officials about the way "they are portrayed in the media" and how about we focus on what is really important? Innocent, hard-working people are being scammed and robbed while we all nitpick words used to describe these criminals. Excuse my vulgarity, but get your head out of your ass and let our police officers do their jobs.
Well hello anonymous.
Ah ha, spell check, eh?
Considering the oral tradition of the Romani, and many other people, I fear your bias only limits your ability to obtain information from cultures other than your own.
I agree with you about a possible headline declaring
Mexican Scam Artists. This however is a sad reflection back on the culture. Mexicans are treated as "illegals" in this country just by their very existence. Can this oppression of Mexican people possibly be a justification of "labeling" others.
Instead of acting like this makes it right for the media in the US to use these type of racist labels, perhaps we should challange the USE OF ANY AND ALL STEREOTYPES AND LABELING/PROFILING.
And what I ask is the "real work of the police".
I shudder to think what you mean by that.
Morgan
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