THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, November 20, 1995 TAG: 9511200070
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JON FRANK AND STEVE STONE
LENGTH: Long : 132 lines
The killing of a 36-year-old Cradock man early Sunday boosted Portsmouth's murder count to a record 37 for 1995, with six weeks remaining in the year.
It was the second homicide of the weekend for the city racked by the region's most serious violent-crime problem. On Friday, the 1992 homicide record was tied when a 20-year-old man eating in a restaurant on Lincoln Street was shot to death by someone with a rifle.
Early Sunday morning, Donald ``Red'' Lancaster, 36, was found shot to death in the first block of Afton Parkway, said police spokeswoman Amber Whittaker.
A 20-year-old Richmond man, Michael Prince, surrendered to police at 11:20 a.m. He is charged with murder and using a firearm in a felony.
Lancaster, of the first block of Loxley Road, was shot once in the chest about 1:30 a.m. and was pronounced dead at the scene. His body was sent to the state medical examiner's office in Norfolk.
Don Miller, Lancaster's cousin, said he believed Lancaster's death was tied to drugs.
``He got mixed up with the wrong kind of people,'' Miller said Sunday night at his home, also in the first block of Loxley Road. ``He was hooked up with drugs bad.''
If Lancaster's killing proves to be drug-related, his death would become another example of the kind of violence that police and FBI officials claim has plagued the city in recent years. Drug murders, they say, have made Portsmouth's murder rate the highest in the region most years - and sometimes among the highest in the nation. In 1993, the city was ranked 24th nationwide, with a murder rate higher than that of Los Angeles.
The rash of drug-related violence has forced the city and the FBI to form special units aimed at arresting the city's most violent criminals, most of whom are believed connected to the illegal drug trade.
Such special efforts are necessary because the murders are harder to solve, says Portsmouth Chief of Police Dennis A. Mook. In some neighborhoods, residents long terrorized by drug dealers are afraid to help police - which explains why Portsmouth's homicide clearance rate is also the region's lowest, Mook says.
At the end of 1994, 40 percent of that year's murders had been solved.
Eleven of this year's 37 homicides remain unsolved.
``We know who did every one of these homicides,'' Mook said during a recent interview to discuss the violent crime problem. ``But we have been stopped dead in our tracks by people who say, `I'll tell you what you want to know. But I'm not going to court.' . . . That is particular to the type of homicides we are dealing with. Rather than the kind in Virginia Beach, where they deal with a lot of domestic type of stuff . . . this is basically in the drug subculture.''
It is the fourth time this decade that Portsmouth has had more than 30 murders during a 12-month period.
Mook would seem to be both right and wrong about the motive for drug murders in 1995, according to an analysis by The Virginian-Pilot and police of the 35 Portsmouth homicides that occurred before the weekend.
Police records show that the illegal drug trade was to blame for eight of the homicides - about 23 percent of them. Simple fighting is listed by police as the cause of 11, or 31 percent.
Eight murders were traced to domestic disputes, while robbery accounted for six, or 17 percent. There was one justified police shooting in 1995 and two killings with unknown motives.
However, police say the percentage of drug-related homicides is certainly higher than the records reflect because many robbery killings are simply drug deals gone bad.
The profile of the typical murder victim in Portsmouth is mirrored in urban areas across the country, the analysis also shows. Most victims are black and most are male.
Of the 35 people murdered, 66 percent were black men and 11 percent were black women.
Victims in Portsmouth often are young, too, averaging 26 years old. Nearly one-third of the victims have been teens.
Nearly 80 percent of the people arrested for the Portsmouth homicides were black men. They also are young. More than half were under 30 years of age.
Public housing complexes, where more than half of the city's 1994 homicides occurred, persist as among the most violent areas. Nine of the city's 1995 homicides occurred in four of Portsmouth's six public housing communities. Ida Barbour alone had four murders.
The good news is that the Portsmouth Police Department is solving more of the city's homicides.
Partly because of a police initiative to speed up the response to violent crimes, homicide investigators have solved eight killings since October. Sunday's arrest makes nine. All have resulted in actual arrests or in charges being filed.
That has helped move the homicide clearance rate close to 70 percent, Mook says.
But clearance rates are deceiving, both in Portsmouth and other cities. Several of the people arrested in Portsmouth for this year's murders already have been released.
And during most years in this decade, the clearance rate has hovered between just 55 and 60 percent. That's notably lower than the clearance rates during the 1980s; those rates always were higher than 65 percent.
Mook blames the decline partly on the loss through retirement of about 25 percent of the police force during the past three years. Many top investigators were among the officers who retired.
Also, Mook says, the department is understaffed and overworked. Norfolk, he contends, employs almost twice as many homicide detectives as Portsmouth and the Norfolk detectives handle only murders.
Before Mook reorganized the department, homicide investigators in Portsmouth also were responsible for some 700 robberies and 500 malicious woundings a year.
Portsmouth's homicide squad now concentrates solely on murders.
But, Mook says, shuffling people around can help only so much.
``When you look at the actual workload of number of crimes per officer, we are the highest in the state of cities over 50,000,'' he said. ``We are a poor city.'' ILLUSTRATION: VP graphic
Portsmouth Homicides
Year/Number of slayings
'85...12
'86...21
'87...29
'88...23
'89...12
'90...18
'91...32
'92...36
'93...33
'94...23
'95...37
Source: Portsmouth Police Department
KEYWORDS: MURDER PORTSMOUTH RECORD CRIME RATE STATISTICS
MURDER RATE by CNB