The first slap came in March when the real estate blog Movoto listed Wilmington as the country's most dangerous small city with more than 1,700 violent crimes per 100,000 residents. But now the distinction by Newsweek as 'Murder Town USA' must feel more like a left hook.
Mayor Dennis Williams said the image of his city of law-abiding citizens is being distorted even though Wilmington this year has tied its own 2007 record with 27 homicides.
"Unfortunately the violent and unlawful acts of a few are what continues to be publicized. To refer to Wilmington as ‘murder town’ is a grossly inaccurate characterization that severely misrepresents the many good-natured residents within our community," Williams said in a statement Wednesday.
Wilmington, which is home to DuPont, is characterized in the article as a city of haves and have-nots that hasn't been able to overcome the challenges brought on by increased crime and poverty.
Newsweek also likens Wilmington to Ferguson, Missouri — two cities where the racial makeup of law enforcement doesn't come close to representing the general population:
When you ask people in Wilmington about the root causes of the city’s crime epidemic, their answers read like the devil’s Christmas list: poverty, racism, lack of economic opportunities, drug and alcohol abuse, gun violence, high dropout rates, teenage pregnancy, stressed families and more. In the U.S., homicide is the leading cause of death for black men between 15 and 34. In Wilmington, where 58 percent of residents are African-American, crime and violence disproportionately affect poor black families, especially boys and young men. Exacerbating tensions between residents and law enforcement is the fact that the police department is 70 percent white and 21 percent black.
Mayor Williams is quoted in the article as blaming the city's crime problems on the state-run school system.
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In March when Movoto listed Wilmington as the country's most violent small city, it looked at more than 200 cities with populations between 50,000 and 75,000. Wilmington has just over 71,500 residents. Cities were ranked according to the number of major crimes in the FBI's uniform crime report from 2012.
The categories of crime included murder, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, theft and motor vehicle theft. Wilmington had 1,703 violent crimes per 100K people. It was the only city in the tri-state area to make the top 10 list.
In case you're wondering, Camden's population is closer to 77,000. So far this year, they've had 42 homicides, according to the county prosecutor's website.
