Posted by Nicholas Stix
The reader who sent me this story, wrote:
Shhh..... don't tell the ACLU or the NAACP.
They might sue the store owners because some darkie was denied the "right" to have sodden, leaden, cold pizza delivered to their front door by some broke dick cracker.
I say, hire the Reverend (sic) Jesse Jackson or Reverend (sic) Al Sharpton deliver sodden, leaden cold pizza to registered Democrats in the 'hood.
http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20130101/METRO01/301010349/Some-pizzerias-halt-trips-Detroit?odyssey=mod%7Cnewswell%7Ctext%7CFRONTPAGE%7Cp
January 1, 2013 at 1:00 am
Some pizzerias halt trips to Detroit
Risk of assaults, robberies cause shops to ban nighttime deliveries
- By George Hunter
- The Detroit News
- 11 Comments
Sicily's Pizza's Mike Andros takes an order to William Horton of Detroit. (John T. Greilick / The Detroit News)
Detroit — When Mike Andros delivers pizza to a home with a fence, he protects himself by swinging the gate toward the street before entering the front yard.
"That way, if you have to make a dash for it, you can just push the gate open, rather than having to pull it toward you," said the 49-year-old driver for Sicily's Pizza in Southwest Detroit. "Those few seconds might make the difference between getting killed or not. These are the kinds of things you always have to think about if you deliver pizzas in Detroit."
Delivery drivers annually appear on the U.S. Dept. of Labor Statistics "10 Most Dangerous Jobs" list. Last year, the occupation, which includes all truckers and drivers, including pizza deliverers, was the 8th-most dangerous, based on the on-the-job death rate of 24 per 100,000 workers.
It can be worse in Detroit, prompting owners of some suburban restaurants to stop sending drivers into the city after dark. Police don't track delivery robberies, but preliminary FBI statistics show that armed holdups are up 5 percent overall in 2012 from last year, to 5,800 from 5,500.
In a city with the second-highest violent crime rate in the nation, pizza drivers say they're easy targets because crooks can make their targets come to them by placing an order and laying in wait. Most drivers carry less than $50. With New Year's Day and Super Bowl Sunday among the busiest days for deliveries, there will be more drivers on the road — and more opportunities for thieves to rob them.
Tony Ventura, manager of Jet's Pizza in Dearborn, is among the restaurateurs who have decided it's not worth the risk to deliver in Detroit at night.
"We'd love to keep delivering in Detroit at night, but it's just too dangerous," said Ventura, whose restaurant had three employees robbed in recent months. Two drivers were robbed at gunpoint; another was assaulted with a baseball bat.
After a Jet's driver was shot in the stomach in August, its managers decided to stop delivering to Detroit at night.
"It's not that we don't want to take food to the people, but we can't keep drivers if we do," Ventura said. "Nobody wants to deliver in Detroit at night."
Bryan Craddock, owner of BC's Pizza in Lincoln Park, decided two years ago to end night deliveries in the city.
"I had a couple guys assaulted; one got beat up pretty bad, and another guy got carjacked," Craddock said. "It got to the point where enough is enough. You get those calls: One of our guys is in the hospital. I've heard of other drivers getting killed before, and that was my biggest fear — I didn't want to get that phone call."
John Tully spent four years delivering pizzas in the city until deciding a few years ago it was too dangerous. He said the holiday season is the worst for attempted robberies "because people are hard up."
"Every year, they tell you that at the pizza place: That this is the worst time," said Tully, 48, of Detroit. "They tried to rob me a bunch of times, but they couldn't catch me — I saw them coming a mile away."
Andros said has never been robbed — but he said that's because he knows the tricks of the trade.
"It's how you carry yourself," he said. "This can be an extremely dangerous job if you don't watch out."
Andros' co-worker, Julio Suarez, said he hasn't been robbed, although his father and brother were robbed and assaulted recently.
"When my dad got robbed, two guys broke his nose, and he had the mark of a boot on his face," said Suarez, 18. "He had to walk back to the pizzeria and call an ambulance. And my brother got robbed over by Joy Road. Luckily, they haven't got me yet."
Tully said he was delivering a pizza on a one-way street when he saw three cars converge in an attempt to block his way.
"I went to back around (the cars) and they started to block me off," he said. "I went around them; they started chasing me like the Dukes of Hazzard. I took a right turn — the car went up on two wheels — and I was gone.
"I wouldn't do that job again in a million years," Tully said. "It just got too crazy."
Ventura said he offers incentives to his Detroit customers to make up for the lack of deliveries at night, including free Jet's Bread if they pick up their food.
"Times are hard right now," Ventura said. "Everyone is losing their jobs, and people are robbing the pizza guy. They're not going to get much; a driver might have $20-30 on him. But that doesn't stop them from robbing us."
[It's not because times are tough that they rob deliverymen; it's because you have a city full of robbers that times are tough. Times are always tough in black Detroit.]
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