WHITE SUBURBAN DRUGGIES HURT BLACK NEIGHBORHOODS

Some white people have a lot of nerve. Hardly a day goes by without a
newscast that shows the dangers that exist in drug-infested
neighborhoods, but on Thursday afternoon, I watched nearly a dozen
white people drive or walk to the back of an abandoned industrial
site, lured by the shouts of "blow," and "rock."

At the end of the day, 463 people were arrested in Operation Double
Play, a massive reverse drug sting conducted at 20 locations on the
West Side. About a third of the suspects were white
suburbanites.

They found their spots by word of mouth. Some hopped a CTA Blue Line
train. Some skipped out of work on lunch break. Others pulled off the
Eisenhower and followed their instincts.

In previous stings, police arrested a total of 1,871 people. Of that
number, 1,256 were black, 361 white, 293 Hispanic, and 4 were Asian.
But don't let those numbers fool you. Because police are targeting
drug spots on the West Side, obviously more African-American drug
users are being snared.

If police had set up stings in Pilsen, Little Village or at any of the
North Side drug spots, I suspect even more white drug users would have
been caught.

Although some people make excuses about why blacks are selling drugs
on the corners in the first place, they're missing the point. Most
white people won't set foot in a predominantly black neighborhood.
They don't shop there. They don't invest their money in setting up
businesses there. They don't even drive through there.

So why should black neighborhoods be the dumping ground for the dregs
of white society?

The same suburbanites who drive into the city looking for drugs would
run a black pusher off their street corners at the barrel of a
shotgun. But on Thursday, white druggies were crawling over West Side
drug spots. Police posing as drug dealers lured them in like fishermen.

There's something else.

Since I went to two different drug spots -- one primarily frequented
by black drug users, and one primarily frequented by white drug users
(even drug users are segregated in this town), I couldn't help but
notice differences in the two groups.

The black drug users included unkempt women with missing teeth,
juveniles, a young hospital worker, and a man who claimed he owned
nine buildings in the area.

Still, it didn't take much nerve for any of them to stagger up the
narrow gangway in a neighborhood where people are so impoverished that
when police arrived to set up the sting, they discovered someone had
stolen the broken-down furniture they left behind after their last
sting.

Absent the sting, police wouldn't have had any reason to stop any of
the black druggies, even in a hot drug spot. After all, they could
have lived in the neighborhood.

But white people? How are the hundreds of white drug users getting
away running in and out of black neighborhoods buying narcotics?

Law-abiding citizens should have chased them all the way back to the
suburbs. Isn't that what would happen if the situation were reversed?

I put this question to Phillip Santucci, 22, after he was busted in
the 4800 block of West Arthington on suspicion of trying to buy heroin.

"What does your neighborhood look like?" I asked.

"It's nice," he said.

"Are there any drug dealers standing around selling
drugs?"

"No, I don't know where to get drugs in Downers Grove," he
said.

Suburbanites arrested on Thursday gave home addresses in Berwyn,
Cicero, Broadview, Wilmette and Glenview. In previous stings, drug
users came from Algonquin, Alsip, Bloomingdale, Bolingbrook,
Braceville, Buffalo Grove, Burr Ridge, Carol Stream, Champaign,
Deerfield, Elgin, Elmhurst, Elmwood Park, Franklin Park, Lisle, Lyon,
Marseilles, Northbrook, Northlake, Oak Forest, Oak Lawn, Ottawa, Park
Ridge, Plainfield, Rankin, Riverdale, Stone Park, Sugar Grove,
Westmont, Wheaton, Wheeling and Wilmington.

All of the suspects were given the option of being under a year's
supervision, community service or drug school.

White suspects caught in these areas should be required to spend a
year volunteering with an anti-violence group.

Although police officials say about one-third of those who have been
arrested in the ongoing stings come from the suburbs, a police officer
said it seems more like 80 percent.

"They are destroying this community," he said. "There are some really
nice people around here, and these people come in and add to their
troubles."

It is a shame that the hapless Cubs fan who interfered with the
fateful foul ball had to leave Wrigley Field under police protection,
but Santucci and others like him breeze into the black community,
creating havoc, without a bit of fear. By the time the shooting stops,
they are back home in DuPage, Lake and Kane counties clucking their
tongues over the mayhem that goes on in the city.

Maybe it's time to racially profile some white people for a change.