I did not quite know where to look when I read the headline: "Study reveals link on drugs and crime". Dear me, really? Bless my soul. Up until this world-shattering survey, I had thought Hutu refugees were responsible for Dublin's crimes; but not, needless to say, in O'Connell Street, where Tom King - presumably the same fine fellow who did such a spiffing job up North a few years ago (glad you've given up wearing those ridiculous spectacles, Tom, you looked a right eejit in them) - recently declared that there is only one crime a day.
And now my Hutu theory is exploded entirely. According to this study, which was commissioned last year by, well, Tom King, Hutus are not responsible for any of the crime in Dublin. Nor are aged lady pensioners called Prudence clutching their sixpences as they travel in on a day trip from Kingstown. Amazing. No, what Tom - "One Crime On O'Connell Street A Day" - King has revealed is that junkies are responsible for crime in the city.
Shock in the Bronx
Give me air. Has Tom - "One Crime On O'Connell Street A Day" - King told his colleagues in New York about this? Because this'll rock them back on their heels. In Harlem and Queens and the Bronx, they've scratching their heads and wondering, Where the Hell Is All This Crime Coming From? You know where it's coming from, Lou?
Search me Al, it's got me beat, ah sheee-it, lookee there Al, another goddamn mugging. Who done it this time, Lou - a vet from World War One, one of them there Hamishes, or is it the Mormons again?
We can put Al and Lou at their ease. The person responsible for the mugging is not a survivor of the Great War of 1917-18. Nor is it a member of that that German community from Pennsylvania which is mistakenly called Dutch. Nor even is it one of that religious community which has its headquarters in Salt Lake City. Release the lot of them, lads (or guys, as you people say). The people responsible for crime in your precincts - as I believe the expression is - are probably DRUG ADDICTS.
Stand back! Stand back! Al and Lou have merely fainted. A soupcon of oxygen, a few minutes of horizontal calm and serenity with their feet slightly in the air, and a pillow under their heads, and they will be write as reign, as the expression rather impenetrably maintains. The poor dears, why should they not faint? They have been in policing all their lives and they have never heard of the connection between crime and drugs. And now these cops over in Dublin, Ireland have come up with the revolutionary new insight: "Study Reveals Link on Drugs and Crime."
Time for some facts. There are 100,000 serious offences in Ireland a year (and here we might thank our criminal community for conscientiously keeping crime to such a nice round number). Some 58,000 are in the Dublin area. According to Tom King, the former Northern secretary who apparently liked Ireland so much that when he finished in Belfast he got a job with the fuzz in Dublin, with just one crime a day, only 356 of the 58,000 crimes in Dublin are on the main thoroughfare, O'Connell Street.
One of the safest
This means that O'Connell Street is actually one of the safest areas in the capital. People should be flocking to O'Connell Street as a haven of peace and security. Hundreds of thousands of people pass through it a week, and only seven are victims of crime. Bless my soul, it's safer than bed.
Now some maintain that the reason why O'Connell Street's figures do not resemble a Vietnam body-count is not because of official policing but because policing has effectively been privatised, and without private security firms, O'Connell Street would one non-stop Tet offensive. Maybe. But I must in all modesty point out that I too have made my humble contribution to policing figures in O'Connell Street.
Some months ago, my bicycle was stolen in O'Connell Street. Kell serprees, as they say. Bicycle theft is probably the commonest form of crime in Dublin, and because it is so common, in accordance with the fascinating policing priorities of the city, it is effectively un-investigated. No matter that a bike will cost £200, and that I have to earn £420 to have £200; try interesting a station sergeant in your stolen bike. You will probably be treated to that extravagant exhibition of constabulary tonsils the rest of us call a yawn.
Why bother?
"Was the bike insured?" asked the garda. I told him that this particular bike - for I have had many stolen - was not. "Well, since you won't be claiming for it, why bother reporting it? You'll never get it back." A formal report was thus never made.
You realise, of course, what this means? It means that the crime never entered the statistics. Had I reported it, crime on O'Connell Street that day would have rocketed by 100%. By my sterling efforts alone, I kept the level of crime on the street down to one a day. I don't know what O'Connell Street's single crime was that day, but I do know it wasn't mine, and Tom - "One Crime on O'Connell Street a Day" - King could sleep safe in his bed.
Now, about this fascinating connection between junkies and crime, Tom. Let's go over it again. . .