The Link Between Anti-Homeless Rhetoric, Public Policy, and Deadly Attacks on Unsheltered People
Kevin Johnson was an odds beater. An athletic LA native, his ambition caught the eye of the National Football League while he was enrolled at HBCU Texas Southern University, and he went on to become that one out of 1,000 football players drafted by the NFL.
His career, like that of most professional players, had highs and lows. Still, Johnson was an overall impressive rotational lineman who played for the New England Patriots, Oakland Raiders, Minnesota Vikings, and Philadelphia Eagles.
There are plenty of things that could be said of his athletic prowess and ongoing legacy. But if you Google Johnson’s name today, you’re unlikely to uncover his rise to fame, his respectable stats, or even his rumored struggle with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, a neurological condition commonly found in football players, that is believed to have contributed to him becoming homeless later in life.
In place of those things, the headlines read: “Former NFL Player Believed to be Homeless, Bludgeoned to Death in Encampment” or an equivalent variation of that text.
The January 2026 investigation into his murder is ongoing. Still, medical examiners thus far conclude the former footballer was the victim of a homicide that took place in the LA-based homeless encampment where he resided, and that he ultimately succumbed to “blunt head trauma and stab wounds”, which caused him to die.
Dehumanized to the Point of Fatality: Homeless Homicides Increase
Tragically, this story would probably not have made headlines had Johnson not been a high-profile figure. While fatal stabbings of homeless encampment residents are astonishingly common, they are rarely reported in mainstream media. Most of the violent crimes against unsheltered individuals go unsolved, unpunished, and unreported. Meanwhile, crimes where homeless people are the perpetrators, which happen at much lower rates, get higher visibility.
This narrative creates public support for homeless criminalization, which further stigmatizes and isolates members of the unhoused community, effectively making them targets for aggressive, even murderous behavior.
Maria Foscarinis, founder of the National Homelessness Law Center, the nonprofit that spearheaded the Housing Not Handcuffs campaign, weighs in, saying it boils down to dehumanization, an “othering” so strong it almost creates a license to kill.
“Violence against homeless people is not new, and longstanding policies criminalizing unhoused people — primarily at the local level — have promoted it,” Foscarinis said. “But recent directives from President Trump and his administration to force unhoused people into detention centers escalate that dehumanization.”
The detention centers she’s referring to function almost the same way as the tent encampments where these mass murders are taking place. The only difference is that they are sanctioned by governments and funded by your tax dollars. Most of these “camps” are even located outside.
In extreme examples, homeless people forced into these accommodations were initially made to sleep directly on the ground and “earn their beds,” which were still outside, by performing specific tasks. This reinforces the harmful stereotype that homelessness is the result of personal flaws as opposed to systemic failures. This stereotype makes it easier for city leaders to continue not solving the crisis.
In the end, the people already victimized by the housing crisis become targets of more brutality. Anger against unsheltered people gives way to hatred, and vigilantes, gang members, serial killers, and mischief makers take that hatred to a fever pitch.
Recently, homeless homicides increased by as much as 60% in under two years. These crimes become more violent and demented as this unsettling “trend” remains unchecked. Here are some other headlines of an equally disturbing nature:
- “Seattle man used ax to kill 2 homeless people” via The Seattle Times
- “‘Budding serial killer’ pleads guilty in Philadelphia attacks on homeless people” via 6 ABC Philadelphia
- “Man beats, violently rapes homeless woman” via CBS 47
From amputations to beheadings, stabbings to arsons, unhoused people are subject to some of the most gruesome deaths imaginable. Headlines like those listed above are sparse, not because these types of events are uncommon, but because homeless news of any kind receives less than .002% of all news coverage nationwide.
As noted previously, most of that coverage is centered on negativity and features the rare stories where homeless people are perpetrators as opposed to the frequent instances wherein homeless people are victimized, their belongings stolen, their rights restricted, their bodies abused, and their lives taken.
“Treating people as less than human signals that violence against them is acceptable — and puts a target on their backs,” Foscarinis concluded.
This kind of dehumanizing rhetoric is the reason that homeless people are 25 times more likely to die of a homicide than their housed peers. Perhaps worse, they are most likely to be murdered while they are sleeping. Imagine being woken up by a nightmarish vigilante and taking your final breaths on the cold street where you were sleeping.
While rates of violence against the unhoused population are extremely high, prosecution of these crimes remains low, making our unhoused neighbors the perfect targets for killers because they are not a protected class. In addition to homicide and violent crime, unsheltered homeless people also exhibit higher rates of death due to exposure, and they are statistically more likely to be hit by cars.
20 homeless people die each day. That’s 20 lives for every day that passes, and we don’t pick up the phone.
Call Your Local Legislators and Urge Them to Protect People from Becoming Homeless
Stop pretending that housed people need protection from homeless people. As long as the narrative echoes the same misleading information, and as long as our laws reflect prioritizing profit over people, we will continue to see murders on the streets of our cities. We will continue to see tent encampments popping up along the sidewalks.
Millions of people endure homelessness each year. Demand your local legislators secure the human right to housing today, because the next person to become homeless and face the violence could be you.