Five-year Violent Crime Decline, Larceny Up Slightly

Preliminary 2010 crime statistics released by the Los Angeles County Sheriff's this morning showed an overall five-year decrease in violent crimes in Diamond Bar and Walnut, with slight increases in the number of reported larceny thefts.

Against 2005 numbers, Diamond Bar saw a 4.8 percent increase in larceny thefts and Walnut saw a 3.3 percent increase. Compared with last year, however, Diamond Bar had a 18.5 percent decrease in larceny theft and Walnut had a 22.1 percent decrease.

Walnut Sheriff's Capt. David Halm said the increase over 2005 could be due to a growing population as well as a number of new businesses opening, such as the Diamond Bar .

"Larceny is always going to be the biggest crime because it's a crime of opportunity," Halm said.

Compared with 2005 numbers, reported rapes for Diamond Bar and Walnut were also slightly up, though Halm said none of those cases were "stranger rapes."

In 2005, Walnut and Diamond Bar each saw one reported rape; in 2010, both cities saw three reports of rape.

According to a 2005 national study by the Justice Department, approximately 64 percent of reported rapes against females were committed by someone known to the victim; 43 percent of rapes against males were committed by someone known to the victim.

The 2005 study also found that 6 in 10 reported rapes occurred either in the home of the victim or the home of a friend, neighbor, or relative.

For the deputies in the field, Halm said, there is no way to intervene and prevent rapes occurring behind closed doors.

Over the same time period, the number of reported rapes for neighboring Rowland Heights — also patrolled by the Walnut/Diamond Bar Sheriff's — decreased from eight to four.

In a , Diamond Bar Patch reported on crime numbers from 2007 to 2009.

The statistics released today provide a look back to 2005 — which Halm said was one of the lowest for crime in recent years — in all of the categories previously reported. All comparisons here are made against the year-end numbers from 2005, which were issued at this time in that year. Updated and more comprehensive preliminary crime numbers will be issued in January.

Overall Part 1 Crimes (violent and property crimes) decreased 15.2 percent in Diamond Bar and 12.7 percent in Walnut since 2005.

Burglaries, which Halm said was the key problem for the area in a presentation to the Diamond Bar city council in November, saw a 13.7 percent decrease in Diamond Bar and an 11.3 percent decrease in Walnut since 2005.

Walnut Sheriff's Sgt. Cruz Solis said that the formation of the Major Crimes Bureau, headquartered in Whittier, and the local community-oriented policing unit have been key to decreases in burglary and robberies in the area.

Capt. Halm said that a task force formed with approval from the Diamond Bar city council in response to a violent robbery occurring around 2008 also helped to reduce burglaries in Diamond Bar.

In the last six months, according to Los Angeles Times crime mapping data, 41 percent of all property crimes in Diamond Bar have been thefts from vehicles and 30 percent home burglaries.

From the same database, Walnut shows 26.5 percent of all property crimes in the past six months to be thefts from vehicles and 40.3 percent home burglaries.

Sgt. Solis said that education has been the best tool for prevention of thefts from vehicles and that residents should be careful to keep valuables out of plain sight when leaving cars unattended for any period of time.

Walnut had signifcant decreases in all other Part 1 crimes since 2005, except for aggravated assault, which stayed static since then with 22 reported incidents.

Diamond Bar had a 46.7 percent decrease in the number of aggravated assaults.

In all other types of Part 1 crime — robbery, grand theft auto, and arson — both Diamond Bar and Walnut had signifcant decreases.

The full crime report for the county is available for download as a PDF file.