The latest NYPD figures show major crime remains up 36% so far this year – even though shootings and murders both saw a dip of about 10% as of Sunday.
“The politicians will say ‘Murder is down!’ and ignore everything else,” said Joseph Giacalone, a retired NYPD sergeant and adjunct professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan.
“Meanwhile, everything else is God awful.”
Grand larceny was up a whopping 48.3%, from 20,374 to 30,205 incidents, auto theft rose 42%, from 5,589 to 7,939, and robbery jumped 39.8%, from 7,366 to 10,294, over the same period in 2021, the data show.
Rapes increased 10%, from 892 to 989, and felonious asasults were up 19.5%, from 13,086 to 15,640, the statistics show.
Meanwhile, murders were down 8.1%, from 284 to 261, the number of people shot dropped 7.4%, from 1,101 to 1,020, and the number of shooting incidents fell 10.1%, from 938 to 843, according to the NYPD data.
“Usually, during these really hot times, you end up with more violence,” Giacologne said. “Maybe it was too hot. But everything else is going off.”
He pointed out that shootings and homicides were up in 2021. making the decrease less noteworthy.
The data also show that murders so far this year were up 2% over the same period two years ago and 48.5% over the same period five years ago. The number of shooting victims and incidents also saw increases over those periods.
“We’ve probably lost two decades-worth of crime reductions, and that’s the real shame,” Giacalone said. “All those years of hard work by the Police Department is all gone in one year.”
A police officer with more than two decades on the job said any current gains by the department are likely to be erased.
“Give it time,” the cop said. “They’re letting bad guys go home. There’s zero consequences for their actions.”