St. Paul, Minnesota is 66 percent white. It’s 13 percent black.

And yet violent crime, just as is documented in every American citizen, has a well-known racial bias. The descendants of Scandinavians aren’t killing one another drug deals or social media beefs; those primarily descended from Africans have a strange proclivity to engaging in the opposite behavior of Scandinavians, though.

Remember, despite being only 13 percent of St. Paul’s population, blacks are doing everything they can to betray the city’s slogan of America’s “most livable city.”[As 2019 closes, St. Paul’s homicide rate doubles last year’s: Police understand why, but solutions remain elusive., Star Tribune, December 14, 2019]:

Neighbors in St. Paul’s Battle Creek neighborhood heard a group of men arguing, followed by loud pops and then quieter ones. Police arrived to find spent shell casings scattered across the road, along with what looked like blood.

Across town, Kacey Luke Feiner, a 22-year-old, turned up in the emergency room of Regions Hospital, not breathing and unconscious, riddled with gunshot wounds.

Within an hour of the first 911 call, Feiner was pronounced dead at the hospital, and St. Paul police had yet another homicide case in what was turning into an unusually bloody year for a community that proudly calls itself America’s “most livable city.” As 2019 closes, St. Paul’s homicide rate has more than doubled that of 2018, reaching its highest level since the mid-1990s.

The killings have instilled fear and unrest in St. Paul’s residents.

“I’m scared for my own kids to be out here,” said Darinda Lumpkins, who lives near the site of one of the shootings.

Politicians and law enforcement officials are debating the path to preventing future violence. Potential solutions include investing in more police officers or technology that would help them find the location of gunfire faster. With no singular cause to the surge, a fitting response is equally difficult to identify.

“Homicides ebb and flow,” said Steve Linders, spokesman for St. Paul police, “and we’re in a year where they’ve spiked dramatically.”

Some of the shootings appear random, such as the case of Javier Sanmiguel, who heard a car crash outside his house and rushed to help. Police say the driver started shooting erratically from the back of his banged-up car and a bullet caught the Good Samaritan in the head.

But most of the killings derive from one or more of three circumstances, said Linders: drug deals, social media beefs that materialize into street fights, and shootings between gang rivals.

A Star Tribune analysis of 2019 homicides in St. Paul found:

• The overwhelming majority — all but three — of the victims died from wounds inflicted by firearms, making 2019 the city’s most deadly year for gun violence ever. Most of the shootings occurred in the streets or in cars.

• The median age for known suspects and victims is 27. Though St. Paul is predominantly white and 50% female, the overwhelming majority of victims were men of color, most commonly black.

• More than half the killings have so far resulted in either murder or manslaughter charges.

• Other metrics of violent crime have dropped in St. Paul from this time last year, including robbery, aggravated assault and rape.

After finding Kacey Feiner, police learned he’d been feuding with a member of EBK — “Every Body Killa” — via text just before the shooting. Police say Feiner, who had recently been released from prison for his role in a 2015 drive-by shooting, belonged to the rival Ham Crazy gang. They went looking for the EBK member, who called himself “Dodo Man.”