Would Rebecca Park be alive today had she known that a rapist had attacked a lone female runner before in Fairmount Park?
Even though the answer can't be known, the question must be asked. And it must be asked every time police fail to do all they can to protect the public from grave risk.
Park, a medical student and vibrant young woman of 30, was raped and strangled July 13 while jogging in West Fairmount Park.
What she and the rest of the public didn't know - but police did - was that a 21-year-old woman had been threatened with a knife and raped in a nearby area of the park on April 30. That victim survived to give police a description of her attacker. But the description was never made public.
Last Saturday, DNA test results indicated that Park's murderer and the April 30 rapist were one in the same.
It's not just opinion that Philadelphia police erred. Taking the blame, Police Commissioner Sylvester M. Johnson said Monday that he couldn't justify not releasing information about the earlier rape. "It should have been done," he said.
Johnson was right to take responsibility. But apologies made, the department must now prove it truly will issue warnings about rapes and sexual assaults.
Declarations by Johnson that "major" incidents will be publicized are confusing. What's major? Two attacks? More? Just one?
And through what channels? Reports need to be sent out beyond media outlets, to include alerts and sketches posted where attacks occur. Any woman, living in any part of the city, should know if a random sexual assault has happened in her area so she can decide whether to take precautions.
Philadelphia police recorded 1,035 rapes last year. Two-thirds were committed by people known to the victim. Publicizing those does not carry nearly the same public-safety impact as publicizing that other third, attacks committed by strangers. Those are the criminals who might well strike again. Those are the crimes police must trumpet.
A Police Department that once deep-sixed many of its rape cases, a department that failed to alert Center City women to a serial rapist who went on to murder Wharton student Shannon Schieber in 1998, must work even harder to earn public trust.
