Felonies And Homicides In New York City Drop Substantially in 2009

Recordkeeping for homicides in New York City began 46 years ago in 1963 and according to New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, the murder rate in New York City reached its lowest point ever in 2009. Kelly revealed that homicide decreased by 11 percent, auto thefts by 14 percent, burglary by eight percent, rape by eight percent and robbery by 18 percent in 2009 when comparing the statistics to the previous year.

Mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, commented on the recently unveiled statistics by saying, “Since 2001, we’ve driven murder down by 29 percent, rape down by 38 percent, robbery down by 34 percent. The conventional wisdom is that when the economy suffers, crime goes up, but we’ve never accepted that premise.”

According to Business Week, Mayor Bloomberg described New York City as the safest big city in the United States upon discovering that his city had the lowest crime rate of the 25 largest cities in the nation. Mayor Bloomberg came to that determination as a result of Uniform Crime Reports that were released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation last week.

New York City Criminal Justice Coordinator, John Feinblatt, praised the city’s strategy to keep illegal guns off of the streets and credited it as an underlying factor behind the continued decrease in felonies and homicides in the area.