Harrisburg Patriot-News 6/26/09
The Harrisburg Chapter of the NAACP is calling on Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell to suspend some civil liberties and impose martial law in the city to halt the wave of recent lawlessness. Chapter President Stanley Lawson also called on Rendell to bring in the state National Guard for at least 30 days and to impose a curfew. In June, there have been at least 12 shootings, many of them in the daytime, including a man killed Wednesday at a busy city intersection during the lunch hour. "The Guard is for floods and natural disasters. I don't know any more of a natural disaster than of our young people being killed," he said at a general membership meeting of about 25 people at Capitol Presbyterian Church, 14th and Cumberland streets. "It's time for some real action," he said. "Right now the important thing is to stop this madness." "We're beyond what the Harrisburg police department can do. We need help," Lawson said. Martial law is a system of rules that takes effect when the military takes control of the normal administration of justice, normally in times of emergency. At about the same time Lawson was speaking, Rendell was at another community meeting in Harrisburg where he promised to have state police patrol city streets to increase the presence of law enforcement.
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