Violent crime has mostly declined over the first half of the year in the city, while total major crime has flatlined, according to NYPD statistics released Monday.
Shootings and murders are both down for the first six months of the year, compared to the same time in 2015. There were 435 shootings so far this year, compared to 545 last year, or a 20% drop, according to the statistics. Similarly, there were 161 murders this year, 11 fewer than last year.
“This was the ultimate team effort,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said, specifically noting the community policing efforts and the department’s focus on technology. Some of the statistics, he said, “suggest big changes in this city that have been engineered over the last 30 months … this model of policing is working more and more.
“All of this is paying off and is creating a momentum that allows the police to be better and better all the time,” de Blasio added. “This is a really powerful moment where the NYPD is getting to do things that it’s always wanted to do.”
Overall major felony crime in 2016 has mostly flatlined. There were 48,309 incidents of crime this year, an increase of 56 crime incidents over last year during the same time period.
There were 706 rapes reported this year as of July 3, an increase of about 6.8%, according to NYPD statistics. Of those committed during the first six months of the year, about 8% are considered stranger rapes and those decreased in 2016, said Deputy Commissioner for Operations Dermot Shea.
The rest are a combination of acquaintance and domestic rapes, and Shea said the department is “constantly advocating for more reporting because we’re aware that this is a unique crime that often goes unreported.” Of those rapes reported this year, one out of every four didn’t occur in 2016, he said.
“The good news is … we’re not done,” Shea said. “We’re getting unprecedented amounts of technology integrated into the systems. The anticipation is that we have not peaked, it’s going to catapult us forward.”
Both the Bronx and Manhattan saw an increase in overall crime for the first half of the year, Shea said. The increase in the Bronx is largely being driven by robberies and domestic-related crimes, he said, which can be correlated.
In Manhattan, grand larcenies driven by scams are on the rise, Shea said. These are often not committed in person, and rather over the phone or internet.
“If it’s too good to be true,” he said, “it is.”
The citywide goal for the end of the year is to stay under 100,000 total crimes, Commissioner Bill Bratton said.
“My projection is the numbers will continue to go down,” Bratton said. “There’s 8 1⁄2 million of us here now — there were 7 1/2 million when I first came to New York in 1990. So, by and large, we’re getting along pretty well with each other.”
