The Third Police District has a crime problem, and whatever action the MPD has taken so far, it has not improved the situation. We noted last month that crime in that District was trending in a notably different direction from the rest of the city, and in May, that outlying trend continued to distinguish itself. That area of the city recorded five sexual assaults in May while burglaries were up 25 percent over the same month last year, assaults with a deadly weapon were up 60 percent, and theft from auto increased 88 percent. The only category of crime that showed a decrease from last May was theft, but there were still 175 reported incidences of that crime in May, far more than in any other Police District. Crime in the Third District is up 19 percent over the same period last year.
As in previous months, the First Police District also experienced increased criminal activity compared to May of 2005, but of a much smaller magnitude than in the Third District. Still, that District has seen a jump of 17 percent in overall crime over last year. Interestingly, and in a departure from 2006 trends so far, the Second District saw an increase in violent crime in May. Crime there had been almost uniformly decreasing until last month.
The eastern half of the city (Districts Five, Six, and Seven) continued to show a bifurcated pattern in crime. There, as in previous months, crime in general continued to fall. For the year, crime is down seven percent in the Fifth District, 12 percent in the Sixth District, and six percent in the Seventh. Homicides remain strikingly high in the east however. Of the 15 homicides recorded in the District in May, 12 took place in those three Districts. As a result, District homicide numbers have pushed upward overall, and the city is now within three (65) of the total recorded to date last year (68).
As we’ve noted before, the Third District is becoming the economic and demographic center of the city. While the increase in crime there likely stems, in part at least, from the growth that District is experiencing, the police need to identify problem areas there and address them.
