The Wall Street Journal reports that in an unusual move, several cruise lines have stopped sailing to St. Croix because of concerns over local crime.<BR>The article in the 7-12 Weekend edition says Holland America and Windstar have canceled plans to sail there and Carnival canceled calls there in May citing a spate of thefts reported by passengers and crew members.<BR>"We had voiced concerns to St. Croix officials, but the problems didn't seem to be abating," a Carnival spokeswoman says.<BR>Royal Caribbean, Seabourn, and some smaller lines will continue to stop there, says the USVI Dept. of Tourism.

Good for them. Maybe St. Croix officials will get the message as soon as it starts hitting them in the wallet.

In fact a USVI Chamber of Commerce spokesperson says the impact will be a loss of $40 million and is pushing to beef up police patrols.

Oh, but how can this be?<BR>The USVI proponents keep telling us that there's no crime in the USVI's?

There is crime everywhere. A friend of mine was mugged in NYC over 4th of July weekend and required 14 stiches.<BR>They only got $125 because $$ and CC's were locked up in hotel safe.<BR><BR>St. Croix has a bigger problem than St. Thomas at the moment. They have both had big problems in the past.

Good! About time! My wife and I were on St. Thomas not so long ago and were robbed by a juvenile who burglarized our room while we were in bed. We awoke and chased the little bastard, but he got away.<BR>The USVI continues to downplay their crime. Nothing will happen until they feel it in their pockets!<BR>We dropped the USVI a few years ago and started vacationing on Tortola. Much better.

Good but maybe too little too late. USVI had a great thing going in decades ago, but has now become just a stop for us on the way to the BVI.

St. Croix has never really recovered its image since the 1972 murder of four tourists on a golf course. The same can be said about St. Thomas after a 1996 incident in Saga Haven where three tourists were shot in a marina parking lot. But to be fair, there were also politics involved with the cruise line pullouts. But in articles and editorials by people living in the region (which I have seen in the St. Thomas Source and the Virgin Islands Daily News), crime was also a major factor in the pullouts. I feel sorry for the people of that region, since crime is hurting the industry on which they depend the most. From what I've heard, the rate of murders and rapes is even higher than last year's in St. Thomas and St. Croix.