These were two groups of construction workers that just did not get along. Investigators were called to four murder-suicide investigations, in which someone killed a family member, housemate or former lover, and then committed suicide. Those high-risk lifestyles, including drugs, gangs and committing homicides during the commission of other crimes, made up 12 percent of the killings in which a motive was determined. Drug-related crimes alone made up 16 percent of all homicides in which a motive was made public. Drug-related homicides are tough to solve and to prosecute.
Every witness comes with a lot of baggage.
What they don't get is it raises the level of violence in the community. But there's another reason for the community to care about drug-related criminals. They have a propensity for getting the wrong house. Dickinson said there was one instance in 2000 in which drug dealers committed a home invasion on the wrong house. The homeowner was not seriously hurt, Dickinson said, but the botched invasion led to two slayings in Tucson last year and one in Phoenix.