P.D. Defies U.S. Trend and Cuts Crime Further

P.D. Defies U.S. Trend and Cuts Crime Further

Proving to be an exception to a nationwide increase in violent crime, the number of murders, rapes and assaults in the city has continued to drop, resulting in the Big Apple once again being named the country's safest big city, according to FBI statistics released last week. "Last year, we reduced crime in nearly every category across New York City and our reductions in overall crime outpace the nation by nearly three times," Mayor Bloomberg said in a statement. "And it is a tremendous credit to our men and women in uniform that we have bucked the national trend and continued to drive violent crime to record lows."

MAYOR BLOOMBERG: Credit goes to cops.

Continues Trend Here

According to the Federal Bureau of Investigation's preliminary Uniform Crime Report, the city experienced a 4.3-percent drop in overall crime last year. Since Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly took over the department in 2002, the city's overall crime rate has been reduced by 17.7 percent.

The number of homicides nationwide, however, rose 2.1 percent last year, with the greatest increase, 4.9 percent, in the Midwest. It was the first such hike in four years.

In New York City, FBI figures show, violent crime continued to drop, falling 1.9%, while property crime fell 5.1%, compared with a national decline of 1.6%.

Michael J. Palladino, the president of the Detectives' Endowment Association, said he hoped the city would fairly reward the officers for helping reduce crime.

"Once again the crime stats indicate that the members of the NYPD are doing more with less," he remarked. "I'm waiting to see when the contractual increases for Detectives are going to reflect the productivity indicated in the crime stats."

Based on the latest figures, Mr. Bloomberg noted that New York is safer than small cities like Lakewood, Colorado, Ann Arbor, Michigan and Anchorage, Alaska. The annual FBI report is based on crime figures from local lawenforcement agencies across the country and is finalized in October.

"The latest FBI report reaffirms the fact that our police officers are doing an outstanding job in suppressing crime though Operation Impact and related strategies," Mr. Kelly said in a statement. The NYPD uses Operation Impact to flood high-crime areas with cops.

For 2005, the total crime index in New York City was 2,680.2 crimes per 100,000 people, according to the report.