Serious crime and shootings showed no sign of slowing down last month as new NYPD data show a 37 percent increase in major crimes citywide, numbers released Wednesday show.
In the first 100 days of Mayor Eric Adams’ administration, the tough-on-crime former police captain has touted the creation of a new anti-gun unit and a return to broken windows policing but so far, the controversial initiatives have done little to stem crime overall.
While both homicides and rapes dropped 15.8% and 4.3% respectively in March compared to 2021, shootings, robberies, felony assaults, burglaries, grand larcenies, auto thefts and hate crimes have all spiked compared to last year.
The overall jump this year is largely driven by steep increases in vehicle thefts, robberies, grand larcenies and burglaries, cops said.
Shooting incidents spiked 16.2% in March and year to date, the NYPD has clocked 332 victims of gun violence – a 14.5% increase compared to the same period in 2021 and an average rate of nearly four shooting victims per day, data show.
“Our police need more help,” NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell said Wednesday during the first crime stats press conference held since Adams took office and only the second time the rookie commissioner has briefed reporters at police headquarters.
“We need help from every corner of the criminal justice system and from everyone who lives in, works in or visits our great city. Any amount of crime and disorder is unacceptable.”
The continued spike in shootings happened during some of the coldest months of the year when gun violence usually dips and it’s a trend that police sources worry will only get worse come summertime when shootings traditionally tick up in the warmer months.
The data comes as Adams, who clinched the vote on the promise he’d bring safety and order back to the Big Apple, marked 100 days in office. His tenure so far has been marred by seven police shootings and crime levels that continue to eclipse pre-pandemic numbers.
While crime remains a far cry from what has been dubbed in Gotham as the “bad ol’ days” of the 1980s and 1990s, they remain at a five-year high overall at least.
Compared to pre-pandemic, 2019 levels, vehicle thefts in March 2022 are up 107%, shootings increased 69%, grand larceny spiked 26%, felony assault is up 22.5% and robberies saw a 37% uptick.
On Monday evening around 7 p.m., 61-year-old Juana Esperanza Soriano De-Perdomo was walking on East 188th Street near Grand Concourse when she was fatally struck by a stray bullet, cops said.
Several days earlier, 12-year-old Kade Lewin was killed when a stray bullet struck him in the head while he was sitting in a parked car with two relatives in Brooklyn and on March 25, a 3-year-old girl was hit by a stray bullet while leaving her Brooklyn daycare around 6 p.m.
The NYPD’s new anti-gun unit, dubbed the Neighborhood Safety Teams and considered a revamped version of the disbanded anti-crime unit, has been chiefed with reducing street crime and shootings. In the three weeks since the program took effect on March 14, the teams have made 135 arrests but only 19% were for firearms, or just 25, said Chief of Department Ken Corey.
Of those arrested for guns, four were juveniles, five have open felony cases and seven were previously convicted of a crime.
In total, 91 of the 135 cuffed have prior arrests, 57 have prior felony arrests and 21 were on parole or probation when they were taken into custody, Corey said.
Of those arrested, only 10% are still behind bars, Corey said, but failed to provide specifics on what the defendants were charged with and why they were out of jail.
Chief of Crime Control Strategies Michael LiPetri attempted to blame the uptick in auto thefts, burglaries and robberies on “recidivists” but the impact repeat offenders have had is negligible. While recidivist arrests for robberies, burglaries and vehicle thefts increased 47% in 2022 compared to 2019, repeat offenders accounted for less than a percent of those arrested for the crimes this year.
When asked how long it’ll take to see a reduction in crime following the creation of the NSTs and change in policing style, Sewell said results are expected “fairly quickly.”
“But we do know it does not take weeks to reverse trends that have happened over the last several years but we are working every single day to change those numbers,” Sewell said.
“We certainly don’t want people to have to wait. One of the reasons we take an overview is we want to see what’s working and what’s not working and be able to correct it as we move along. We are definitely not taking our eye off the ball and we expect our results to be reflected in that and that’s what I think we are starting to see.”
Additional reporting by Tina Moore
