NYC Sees Safest Summer Ever Despite Recent Murder Uptick: NYPD

NEW YORK — New York City saw what officials called the safest summer on record despite a year-over-year increase in murders last month. The NYPD recorded 48 slayings in July and August combined, the lowest number ever for those two months, police officials said Tuesday.

The number of shootings from Memorial Day to Labor Day also fell to 257 from 261 last year, helped by a record-low 76 shootings for August alone, officials said.

The seven most serious crimes — murder, rape, felony assault, burglary, robbery, grand larceny and auto thefts — are down 1.2 percent overall so far this year, the NYPD said.

"We all remember the concept of the long hot summer, and we all looked with a certain dread towards July and August," Mayor Bill de Blasio said at a news conference. "What the NYPD has done in August of 2018 to actually take shootings down even further is extraordinary."

The drops came despite a spike in murders for the month of August and a small year-to-date increase over last year.

Police recorded 23 killings last month, up from 17 in August 2017, said Chief of Crime Control Strategies Lori Pollock. Those were among 195 murders in the first eight months of this year, up slightly from 191 in the same period last year, she said.

Rapes also increased over the prior year for the 12th straight month — there were 153 in August, up more than 24 percent from the 123 recorded in August 2017, the NYPD said.

Grand larcenies and vehicle thefts also rose 1.5 and 3.9 percent year-over-year, respectively, while robberies fell 12.3 percent, police figures show. Felony assaults and burglaries remained essentially flat.

The city saw a rash of gang-related murders in July even as the number of slayings that month tied a record low. Police have worked to tamp down gangs with various initiatives including "Ceasefire," in which cops work with clergy, community leaders and other partners to encourage gang members to stop the violence, Pollock said.

"We focused our efforts on the few who commit the majority of crime," Pollock said.

The summer also saw nearly 300 extra cops hit high-crime areas for the NYPD's "Summer All-Out" initiative, which ends this month.

Police brass will continue to keep an eye on crime into the fall, when street violence typically drops, and deploy additional officers if needed, Police Commissioner James O'Neill said.

De Blasio, a Democrat, said the city is on pace to "match or exceed" the crime levels from last year, when fewer than 300 murders were recorded for the first time since the 1950s.

"Right now in a number of categories the NYPD is actually showing that even the unbeatable year can be beaten," the mayor said.

(Lead image: Photo by David Allen/Patch)