Drawing Parallels Between New York City and Baltimore

The death of Freddie Gray, who was injured while in police custody, sparked rioting in Baltimore, much like the chokehold death of Eric Garner prompted massive protests here in New York.

But the demonstrations in Baltimore have taken a violent turn.

Peter Moskos, an associate professor at John Jay College and a former Baltimore City police officer, said Baltimore has always been more violent than New York, due in part to long-entrenched problems like poverty.

"It's much more concentrated poverty [in Baltimore]," he said. "There's just a lot more crime there. Even the so-called bad neighborhoods of New York have a majority of people who, you know, get up in the morning and go to work, and you don't have the blight and the vacant buildings that you have in Baltimore."

Moskos believes police in Baltimore also have a harder time doing their jobs.

"We put the cops there in Baltimore and tell them basically, 'You deal with all of America's problems, you deal with centuries of racism, you deal with unemployment,'" he said. "It's a very tough position to be in, and then when something goes wrong, then we blame the police. But we should be looking at society."

In this interview, WNYC's Richard Hake speaks with Moskos about the parallels that can be drawn in the wake of Gray's death in Baltimore and Garner's death in New York, as well as how the response of the public and the police have been different.