Eastmont

Unfortunately Eastmont’s claim to fame is nothing that you would want for a neighborhood you are looking to move into. On March 21, 2009, four Oakland officers were killed by Lovelle Mixon here. Two, Sgt. Mark Dunakin and Sgt. John Hege were killed when they stopped Mixon for a traffic violation and two others, SWAT Sgts. Ervin Romans and Daniel Sakai when they forced their way into the home where Mixon was barricaded. Mixon was killed at the site as well. The event made news as it was the worse loss of life in a single day for the Oakland police. A large funeral service was held for the fallen officers.

Although the murder of officers is thankfully not a common occurrence, Eastmont is no stranger to violence of this kind. Tiny, densely packed Eastmont averages about 4 murders per year. Given that the population is less than 4,000, that is one murder per 1,000 residents—the worst ratio I am aware of in all of Oakland. Thus, you might say that this is the most dangerous neighborhood in the whole of the East Bay. I would be surprised to find a neighborhood that had it much worse than this.

Driving through the neighborhood, you might not at first notice that it is a particularly dangerous area. The small, old style Ranch homes and California bungalows don’t, at first sight, seem as if they are particularly run-down or fearfully shut off. But then you turn down a particular street and you start to see more ominous signs—bars on windows, high gates around small yards, cars parked on uncared for front lawns as if they were meant to get the occupants as close to the shelter of the home as possible.

Then some worse signs: a vandalized car with broken windows and smashed headlights with no tires—a boarded up home with garbage and furniture piled up by the curb—cars with faded paint and mismatching panes parked behind the added impediment of fences or deep into the side driveway of a gated home. None of these are proof positive of the violence but they all point to an oppressed neighborhood where violence is at the forefront of people’s thought on an hourly basis.

Put simply, this feels more like a war zone than a neighborhood, more like Bosnia of twenty years ago than the United States of today.