NYC Crime Up 17%

New York City has long been the exemplar of a big city that achieved big drops in it crime rate. Today, though, the NYPD released a disturbing report that crime in the month just ended is up nearly 17% over the same month the year before.

Robbery, burglary, assault, and grand larceny are all up substantially, and grand larceny auto is up a staggering 72%.

Murder is down 21% even though shootings are up 29%, prompting the Seinfeldian Question, “What’s up with that?”

A shooting is usually a murder if the victim dies and an aggravated assault if the victim lives. Sometimes the difference is the speed and quality of emergency care. Has there been that much improvement in one year? That’s a little hard to believe. Small-number statistics have more random bounce than large ones when expressed as percentages. The number of NYC murders per month is in the 20s for both January this year and January last year, compared to thousands for assault and larceny. It could be just random bounce.

Reported rapes are down 28%. Good news, but the press release notes that “Rape continues to be underreported.”

Why is NYC crime up generally? The most obvious reason would be the current mayor’s systematic dismantling of the successful programs of the two previous mayors. There is also the state’s new bail law. Anthony DeStefano reported for Newsday, before the actual release of data:

In January, serious felonies citywide continued to rise throughout the month. NYPD commissioner Dermot Shea is scheduled to talk about the overall upward trend Tuesday during his monthly crime briefing. He is again expected to call on the legislature in Albany to tinker with the bail law, which took effect Jan. 1. The new law eliminates bail for most nonviolent crimes.

The article goes on to say:

To buttress Shea’s argument, NYPD officials are likely to include statistics showing the percentage of newly arrested suspects set free without bail despite being repeat offenders, said one official who didn’t want to be named.

Those numbers are not mentioned in the press release.