Shooting Crimes Up Last Month
7th Sep 2005, 14:52 GMT
With statistics showing that the past four weeks have had higher numbers of shootings versus the same period last year, the Post give us the vintage headline: Slay It Ain't So. Shooting deaths were up 13% and shootings up 10%, driven by a 70% increase in incidents in the Bronx. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly tells the Post the "upturn is probably a 'spurt,'" and while the NYPD is "always concerned about shootings," he continued to emphasize that the city, overall, still has record low levels of crime: "We are still 20 victims below [the first eight months of] last year, which was a historically low year [with 571 killings]." Other stats for the past four weeks versus last year: Murders are down and subway crime is down 10%, though subway felonies are only down by one, perhaps because of the increased police presence. The four week period is from August 8 till September 4, a period that saw incredibly hot, uncomfortable weather; Gothamist wonders if the "spurt" is attributable to that.