Poverty creates violence. All around people have enough to eat, drive nice cars, seem to have everything that they want. When you live in poverty that life is far away. As a teenager it creates frustration. If you realize that your life will not have any of these things frustration turns to violence.

Poverty creates gang activity. As gang activity pays off, through drug sales and the like, It continues on as its a positive reward, money, for violence. Why would one change a profession if they are living a better life. Unfortunately the sales of drug to the poverty stricken class, even takes more money away from them, the cycle escalates. The poverty stricken now become even less able to be functional and loose any chance of a better live. They find that the system for support can be manipulated and take what they may get. The drugs lead to poor decision making, in this case perhaps this tragedy.

The people that live above the poverty line, then wonder why there is so much violence. DUH. Its like dangling food in front of a starving animal. Except in this case its, housing, cars, TVs, you know the good life.

We tell them, you can drag yourself out and be a productive part of society, you need to work hard. But education after public school is impossible to afford. Think of the prospect of never making more than 5 dollars a hour, if you got married and your wife worked thats 10 dollars a hour. In New York, where can you live on that wage?

If your wealthy, opportunitys in todays enviornment are readily available, even if your a slouch. Your parents will have friends that owe favors and someone will give you a job. Look at all the managers that are idiots, they certainly didnt get their jobs on real work performance. Or look at the Madoffs, they were just high profile criminals running a grifting scheme. They were able to do this because of the good old boys club mentality.

When your poor your opportunitys are sports hero, less than .04 percent, hard work putting yourself through school and getting a good job, less than .1 percent or violence and drug trade, almost at 20 percent.

We just choose to ignore this.

When a teen commits a crime, lets charge the parents too. This might solve a number of problems.

Why won't MSNBC show a picture of the thug?

Welcome to the new America folks !! It's gonna get fun. May God help us.

If you look for other articles on this story online, there are plenty, with much more detail. The 9 year old was at home with his grandmother who was baby sitting him. The 17 year old came into their apartment, seemingly as a friend, and "evidently" there was an argument over a video game. The grandmother was in another room and did not actually witness what occurred next. The 17 year old dragged the 9 year old from his grandmothers 3rd floor apartment, up to the roof and tossed him off. Several neighbors heard the young boy yelling STOP, etc. while he was dragged the entire way. No one stepped up to actually see what was going on or do anything.

So IMHO, not only is the 17 year old guilty of attempted murder (if the boy doesn't die), but the residents who heard the boys screams and did nothing, should feel just as guilty. I can't imagine how much screaming one would have to hear when a child is being dragged from their apartment, down a hall, up stairs to a roof of a 7 story building, across the roof and then off the roof.... and not at least DO SOMETHING.

MY MOST SINCERE HEART FELT SYMPATHIES AND BEST WISHES FOR A FULL AND QUICK RECOVERY FOR THE LITTLE BOY. and MAY GOD HAVE MERCY ON THE SOULS OF THE REST OF US WHO JUST STAND BY.

Typical half-story from No Basic Coverage news. What is the story? Half the information doesn't tell us anything.

The same thing should happen to him. take his a$$ up to the roof, and throw him over. head first.

burn the mental case!!

Uh oh. We need a task force on rooftops. Get Biden on the job, riding to the rescue of all potential roof victims.

How much of MY money do you want to put into "stopping violence"??? You cannot stop violence or gun shootings or drugs. It's just a money pit...throwing good money after bad. Demented people will do demented things. Laws protect the criminals...oh my gosh...we can't lose sight of the fact that "criminals have rights too" at least that's how they're treated in the system. Government starts a project or task force to "stop violence, etc." and monies put into these programs will get funnelled into politicians pockets! Economics 101. NO program will stop anyone from doing what they set their minds to. If you believe otherwise, well then, tell me how a tax payer funded program would have stopped this piece of sh*t from throwing that poor 9 year old off the roof. Good God! I say kill the attacker right there and stop wasting MY money (and YOURs too!).

We don't need less guns, we need justice; swift and powerful. There are millions of people in America alone who should be eliminated from the gene pool. Enough with this "we are all created equal" nonsense.

OMIGOSH, that little boy is in critical condition! I hope they throw the book at the 17-year-old who did this to a little kid. I don't even need to know the details - you just don't throw a person off a roof - not anyone!

Isn't there something we can Ban to stop this tragic crime.

Wow... what kind of 17yr old fights with a 9yr old ?? I hope he is prosecuted as an adult. Really drastic fight over a video game, . and with such a young child.

People prey on each other at so many levels. Even kids do it.

A 17 year old is a man to me while a 9 is a child.

I hope the 9 year old recovers and doesn't die of what is really stupidity, and that the 17 years old is tried as an adult. A 17 years old should protect a 9 year old.

After reading many of the comments here. Many seem to be against violence and then promote it at the same time. So are you saying that as long as it is government sponsored violence, all is well. We all know the government is never wrong.(sarcasm)

Bad parenting begets bad kids. Children are raised respecting nothing and taking no pride in anything, as our dismal education system could tell you.

Some people in our society are just evil, and that does not change. The courts only need to assure that individual will never walk in society again regardless if he is a teenager. Teenagers know right from wrong.

I wonder if the apartment was welfare housing?

I dunno. I guess I am getting old . When I was 17 in 1974 we never came close

to thinking about harming a 9 year old. I had a 9 year old brother bacK then that I felt like killing sometimes.

( kiling in a you irritate the hell out of me sense). It is one thing to think about an act. It is another to carry out the act. A 17 year old is almost a man a 9 year old is still a little boy.

It's time for America to take back her streets from the filth that now runs it. And we're going to need guns to do it!

wow...makes me want to live in NY. What is so special about living here...all you hear is about the violence, not that you don't have it else where... but really!

Most people who commit violent acts are not inherently evil. True psychopaths are pretty rare. As one earlier poster remarked, teen-age boys are not the most stable or controlled individuals. If you add in their exposure to environmental violence, domestic abuse, etc. you increase the odds that they will view violence as an acceptable solution to a variety of conflicts. If you also add in poverty, poor education, hopelessness and poor peer influences, they can easily decide that violence will give them satisfaction.

On top of all of that, you have the adults who should set an example of restraint and reason behaving like spoiled, self-indulgent children who call themselves legislators, and you have an environment that fails to provide any positive role models.

We have a justice system that gets it wrong as often as it gets it right. You have sentencing laws that put non-violent offenders in jail for twelve years while releasing the violent with a slap on the wrist. We have a mental health system whose response to indications of violent delusions who attempt to treat without supervision, throwing pills at serious psychosis, hoping dosages are right, hoping side effects are not negative.

Everyone seems to think that there is one simple solution for a complex societal breakdown. We need to be working on a multi-faceted approach, understanding that there are many factors that contribute to violence, one of which is ready access to guns, but that is only a part of the problem. We must also focus on mental health, our justice system, our worship of violence, our own failures to provide hope to those stuck in a cycle of poverty, etc.

How about not calling one another ugly names? How about treating one another with reason and respect? How can we demand reason and respect from teen-agers when the posts right here on this vine are completely lacking in either?

I think that immediate legislature is necessary that will outlaw 5 story apartment buildings and 17 year old boys. This is yet another wake-up call for mental health reform.

Eye for an eye. Toss the little punk off the same roof.