“Mikey,” a chubby-faced 17-year-old crack dealer, paced around a desolate lot working a graveyard shift, says the Philadelphia Daily News. A steady stream of addicts ambled toward him to make a buy. He saw a close friend’s mom. “I need a nick,” she mumbled. Without hesitation, he sold her a nickel bag – $5 worth of crack. “I was thinking that a real friend wouldn’t sell to his mom,” said Mikey. “If he found out, how would he feel? But that is life. If she won’t get it from me, she will get it from somewhere else.”
One of the most appalling features of the city’s deadly year of crime is that the youngest drug dealers are getting younger. Drug dealing attracts children as young as 10, and police are only beginning to scratch the surface of the kiddie drug world. More children selling drugs means more children shot. Among the biggest increases in shooting victims this year are 14-year-olds. Sometimes, the innocent are caught in the crossfire: The men behind the shooting death of a 5-year-old girl in her family car had drug records that stretched back to their teens. “Drug corners are every police officer’s problem,” Police Commissioner Sylvester Johnson said. “I am holding everyone accountable. This is the new focus.”