In yesterday’s Chicago Tribune, reporter Gary Marx told the story of a young man who, as a 10-year-old helped commit one of the most notorious murders in Chicago history. In 1994, Jessie Rankins and a friend dropped a 5-year-old boy to his death from the window of a high-rise public housing complex. A life like that may seem doomed to failure, but Dr. Carl Bell says the lives of children like Jessie Rankins don’t have to have a foregone conclusion.

Dr. Bell is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the president and CEO of the Community Mental Health Council. Today he’s in Washington, D.C. to present a report to Congress that argues for aggressive preventive action on the issue of violence.

Music Button: Menahan Street Band, “The Traitor”, from the CD Make The Road By Walking, (Daptone records)