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Big-City Troubles Move to Phoenix
As Growth Soars, So Does Crime


By John Pomfret
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 14, 2006; A03


PHOENIX -- Like many of her neighbors, Janet Sperling moved to Phoenix from somewhere else -- in her case, Los Angeles. When her husband got a job offer at a high-tech firm, she said there wasn't even a debate about leaving California in the rearview mirror.

Sperling said she and her husband, who moved to Arizona in 1990, fled high crime and the sense that Los Angeles was "just too big and out of control."

But in the years since growth chased the Sperlings to Phoenix, the population of this desert metropolis has jumped 50 percent, to about 1.5 million; the city has grown to 517 square miles, making it bigger than sprawling Los Angeles; and Arizona's crime rate has been recognized as the worst in the nation. According to the Arizona Criminal Justice Commission, Arizona ranks first in property crime and motor-vehicle theft, second in larceny, fourth in burglary and fifth in murder.

"And in our neighborhood," said Sperling with a sigh and what appeared to be an almost instinctual look over her shoulder, "we now have a serial rapist killer. I guess we're a big city now."

The United States' sixth-largest city, and expected to grow another 50 percent in the next eight years, Phoenix has always seemed to purposely box under its weight. In an interview, Mayor Phil Gordon (D) described the city as a "small town," where "an outsider can come in and do well."

Gordon enthused about the region's pro-business climate, its highly educated workforce, its parks and a planned multibillion-dollar light rail system that has turned Phoenix's resurging downtown into a construction site.

But others point out that Phoenix now faces all the challenges of other massive, sprawling Western cities, such as Los Angeles, with the only difference being that it lacks Los Angeles's edgy street cred.

Phoenix is Los Angeles without Hollywood, gangsta rap and a beach. Its gang problems are world-class. Its crime rate has surpassed Los Angeles's. Law enforcement officials consider it a hub of the immigrant- smuggling trade. Methamphetamine has wreaked havoc among its underclass.

Its school districts sag under the weight of a student population born in countries around the world. By 2020, it is estimated, 35 percent of its population will be Hispanic, up from 28 percent today.

The land of eternal sunshine, with one of the highest percentages of sunny days of all U.S. cities, also has one of the highest divorce rates. While Phoenix generates more job growth than almost any other major metropolis, its teenage birth rate is also among the nation's leaders.

"It's becoming more and more like L.A.," said Sperling's neighbor, Diane Thompson, another transplant from Southern California. She grew up in Los Angeles in the mid-1980s when it was terrorized by serial killer Richard Ramirez, the Night Stalker -- who was ultimately convicted of 13 murders and 11 sexual assaults.

Over the past year, Phoenix has been plagued by not one but three serial killers, who are blamed for 14 murders and dozens of shootings, rapes and robberies. Residents around the District experienced something similar in October 2002 when snipers murdered 10 people during a three-week period.

In Phoenix, two men, dubbed the Serial Shooters, allegedly worked as a team; they were arrested on Aug. 3 in connection with a spree that left at least six people and several animals dead, and at least 16 people wounded. Assistant Police Chief Bill Louis said Samuel John Dieteman and Dale S. Hausner called their reign of terror "RV," short for "random recreational violence."

A third predator, known as the Baseline Killer because he has abducted women from that section of Phoenix, is wanted in connection with eight murders and a string of rapes and robberies, beginning with a sexual assault last August.

Police have few clues to go on. A composite drawing has been changed several times. "The information is so elusive that it's kind of hard to develop a profile, so we've now asked people to focus on the behavior," Louis said. "I have a personal interest in this case," he added. "My youngest son lives in that neighborhood and has a young family there."

Complicating the Baseline case is the fact that a man from Kentucky confessed to one of the murders and was indicted. However, Phoenix police subsequently said they had uncovered evidence that his alleged victim was killed by the Baseline Killer. The Kentucky man recanted but is still facing charges as prosecutors try to sort it out.

Phoenix has been growing since World War II, when several air bases were located there so pilots could practice year-round. Growth took off in the 1950s with the advent of air conditioning and the relocation of manufacturing concerns from California to Arizona -- part of a Cold War plan to move strategic industries away from the coast.

Phoenix's development was unusual in the United States because traditionally great American cities grew up around ports, like New York City, or railheads, like Chicago. "Phoenix is a truly post-World War II city," said Elliot Pollack, who runs a firm here specializing in economic analysis.

"It's entirely a function of the automobile and the truck."

For years it was known as a retirement destination as "snowbirds" from the Northeast and Midwest flocked here for the winter months. But these days, its median age is below the national average, and on average its population has grown every year for decades.

"Cities like Phoenix that change very rapidly tend to have high crime," said Scott Decker, the chairman of the criminology department at Arizona State University. "The economy can't absorb newcomers. There's a lack of established traditions. In cities of high transient populations like Phoenix, that's what's going on."

Nonetheless, Pollack contended, Phoenix is well placed to overcome its challenges. For one thing, unlike some cities, such as Detroit and Cleveland, he said, Phoenix's tax base is growing.

"I'd rather be Phoenix facing all these problems than some cities back East," he said.

As for the "small town" label, though, a senior police officer had this to say: "The politicians may like to use that one, but not us. We're realists."