According to a new report by the Economic Policy Institute, the wealthiest 1 percent of American households had a net worth 288 times as large as the median household wealth of $57,000 in 2010. This constitutes a huge increase from 1962, when the ratio was 125-1:

Since 1983, nearly three-quarters of the growth in total household wealth went to the top 5 percent, while the bottom four-fifths of American households saw their wealth decrease:

This is yet another indication of the explosion of income inequality that has occurred over the last few decades, as more and more of the country’s income and wealth traveled to the richest Americans. This is detrimental to America’s economic success because, as EPI explained, “wealth makes it easier for families to invest in education and training, start a small business, or fund retirement.” Wealth also makes it easier to cope in a financial emergency.

In the wake of the tragic shooting at a movie theater in Aurora, CO earlier this month, the nation has been engaged in a dialogue about the best ways to prevent violent crime — including passing stricter gun control legislation, requiring more background checks for firearm purchases, and increasing mental illness reporting. However, one writer at Scientific American suggests that homicides in the U.S. actually stem from a very different kind of source: the nation’s high rates of income inequality.

Eric Michael Johnson cites a study conducted by Harvard’s Ichiro Kawachi that analyzed the homicide rates in each state and the District of Columbia. Kawachi found that as the gap between the rich and the poor rose, the rate of homicide rose along with it:

The results were unambiguous: when income inequality was higher, so was the rate of homicide. Income inequality alone explained 74% of the variance in murder rates and half of the aggravated assaults. However, social capital had an even stronger association and, by itself, accounted for 82% of homicides and 61% of assaults. Other factors such as unemployment, poverty, or number of high school graduates were only weakly associated and alcohol consumption had no connection to violent crime at all. A World Bank sponsored study subsequently confirmed these results on income inequality concluding that, worldwide, homicide and the unequal distribution of resources are inextricably tied.

Income inequality in the U.S. has been rapidly rising since 1979. And an uptick in violent crimes certainly isn’t the only documented negative effect of the widening gulf between the rich and the poor. Studies have already shown that economic disparity has caused a problematic education gap, put an outsized burden on the Social Security program, and stifled the political power of a downtrodden middle class.

Bank of America has decided to renegotiate the terms of a Minnesota homeowner’s mortgage just days before it was scheduled to be auctioned off following a week of action by activists with Occupy Our Homes MN and other groups. Ruby Brown began fighting the foreclosure more than five years ago. She found out last week that the bank had canceled a scheduled sheriff’s auction, according to OccupyOurHomes.org:

After a five-year battle over now-illegal lending practices, a bank error that dropped her from a loan modification program, and a campaign with Occupy Homes MN, north Minneapolis homeowner Ruby Brown has received a mortgage renegotiation from Bank of America, just days before her home was to be auctioned off.

“This is an incredible victory for Ruby, who has been in the struggle for so long. It’s also something that can and should happen for everyone facing the loss of a home right now,” said Susan Kikuchi, an organizer with Occupy Homes MN.

Brown isn’t the only homeowner to face foreclosure over banking errors. Wall Street banks have used fraudulent documents to process foreclosures, illegally foreclosed on members of the military, and foreclosed on homes over small clerical errors. The biggest lenders were subject to a $25 billion mortgage fraud settlement with the federal government and state attorneys general earlier this year.

The victory is the latest in a string of successes for the Occupy Our Homes movement and Occupy Our Homes MN in particular, which has targeted Minneapolis’ hardest-hit neighborhoods and helped numerous homeowners — including the mother of one of its own organizers — stave off foreclosure.

An independent report (PDF) commissioned by the city of Oakland concluded that the crowd-control tactics that the Oakland Police Department used to subdue Occupy protesters last year were “outdated, dangerous, and ineffective.” This report comes on the heels of last month’s report from a different outside monitor that reached the same conclusions.

In its 180-page report, The Frazier Group consulting firm outlined the internal issues plaguing Oakland’s police department, ranging from too much command turnover to limited funds to a lack of compliance with the national standards for police conduct. The consultants concluded that the October 25 clashes between Occupiers and police forces — when police attempted to subdue protesters with rubber bullets, flash grenades, and smoke bombs, injuring an Iraq War veteran in the process — were due to a combination of these factors:

Aircraft accident investigations frequently reveal that airplane crashes are caused by a series of cascading events, not a singular problem. We at Frazier Group feel that this analogy appropriately describes our observations within the Oakland Police Department. Years of diminishing resources, increasing workload and failure to keep pace with national current standards and preferred practices led to the cascading elements resulting in the flawed responses noted during the events of October 25, 2011.

There have also been investigations into the use of excessive force against Occupy protesters in cities other than Oakland. After the infamous pepper spray incident at an Occupy protest at the University of California-Davis, two outside reports also concluded that the police’s use of force was “unreasonable.”

More than three dozen activists attempted to prevent a court-ordered eviction in Washington D.C. this morning before being forcefully removed from the property by U.S. Marshals. The activists, who are affiliated with Occupy Our Homes DC, were attempting to stave off the eviction on behalf Dawn Butler, a D.C. resident who has lived at her home for more than six years.

Activists assembled outside the home around 8 a.m.; D.C. Metro Police and U.S. Marshals arrived shortly thereafter. Metro Police warned protesters that they would be subject to arrest after multiple warnings if they didn’t leave the property. Less than an hour later, a half-dozen U.S. Marshals walked to where the protesters were sitting and announced that they would carry out the eviction. When protesters sitting on the home’s front walkway refused to leave, the Marshals began forcefully removing them, dragging some across the sidewalk and others down the front stairs.

After nearly a half-hour, the Marshals reached the front door of the home, where multiple activists tied themselves to milk crates and the door to prevent entry. The Marshals, again using brute force, yanked the protesters away, ripping half of the home’s front door away with them. Marshals tossed one protester over the side of the home’s front porch, sending him sprawling onto his back in the neighbor’s yard and prompting shouts of, “Shame! Shame!” from the activists. Watch it:

At that point, an eviction crew entered the home and removed all of Butler’s belongings, stacking them on the sidewalk. Activists planned to use a moving truck to take Butler’s possessions to storage.

The home went into foreclosure more than two years ago, and Butler, who rents the home, was facing eviction from JP Morgan Chase. Butler challenged the eviction on the grounds that she was denied her right to first refusal when she and her mother attempted to buy the home in 2010. Both Butlers said they received no response from JP Morgan when they submitted a bid for the home.

The court granted Butler a stay from eviction on April 2, but issued an order for eviction Monday. Butler returned to court this morning seeking another stay.

“They’re taking homes just for no reason. They haven’t given us a reason,” Butler said today. “It’s hell. Hell on earth.”

“In this case, the court ruled that the lease was not valid,” JP Morgan Chase said in an official statement. “The tenant had no legal right to remain in the property.”