Official Philadelphia Metro Crime Thread (Parkside: annually, historical, compare)

[RightonWalnut]

Originally Posted by Cnote11

Any ideas one what is causing this drop in numbers we are seeing so far?

There have been several new crime fighting techniques implemented this year. Whether they work in the long run will be seen later this year I guess lol.

[RightonWalnut]

Originally Posted by Cnote11

Are you talking about the Hunting Park murder? Yesterday, the statistics said 22 murders, and today it says 24. Perhaps they take awhile to finalize and update them as murders and that was really the last murder but it just wasn't counted officially yet. Either that, or there wasn't anything reported about these two.

I guess you could consider the area Hunting Park. It's technically not though.

[rraC ynnaD]

Originally Posted by Summersm343

The last two murders? One was in West Kensington the other was in North Philadelphia right on the border of North Central and Tioga/Nicetown

Not shocking.

[Cnote11]

Originally Posted by Summersm343

I guess you could consider the area Hunting Park. It's technically not though.

I'm just going off the headline! Any information on the crime fighting techniques?

[Marius Pontmercy]

Originally Posted by Cnote11

Are you talking about the Hunting Park murder? Yesterday, the statistics said 22 murders, and today it says 24. Perhaps they take awhile to finalize and update them as murders and that was really the last murder but it just wasn't counted officially yet. Either that, or there wasn't anything reported about these two.

I didn't hear about the two over the weekend that brought it to 24. I suppose one might have been the shooting in Hunting Park. The victim was in critical condition. Maybe he didn't make it?

I think there's a large degree of chance that goes into a homicide. The right events have to add up most of the time: two gangs, wrong part of town, wrong time of day, petty argument, etc. The right people have to be in the right places for it to go down, and maybe some years you get more of those events than others, simply due to chance.

Oh, and any word on other metro areas? Is this a unique decrease here or is it happening in other cities? We're less than two months in, but a 41% decrease is still pretty eyebrow-raising.

[Cnote11]

Good question! I found some data for Chicago
January 2013: 43 homicides
January 2012: 40 homicides
February 2013: 3 homicides as of February 6th
February 2012: 40 homicides

We'll see how it pans out as the month comes to a close, but it seems that Chicago's murder rate may be up or--depending on the amount of murders in the first 6 days of February last year--it is at least stabilized.

[Cnote11]

On a week-by-week breakdown

The first week December 31 - January 6, 2013 saw a 0% changes between 2012 and 2013 homicides. It did see a decrease by 17% in violent crimes and 14% in property crime.

January 7 - January 13, 2013 saw a 53% decrease in homicide and a 16% and 11% decrease in violent crimes and property crime.

January 14 - January 20, 2013 saw a 54% decrease in homicide and an 11% and 7% decrease in violent crimes and property crime.

January 21 - January 27, 2013 saw a 45% decrease in homicide and an 11% and 10% decrease in violent crimes and property crime.

January 28 - February 3, 2013 saw a 42% decrease in homicide and 11% decrease in both violent crimes and property crimes.

It seems that the decrease in violent crimes and property crimes has been steady so far. Hopefully this number keeps up and we see another dip in these statistics for the second consecutive year.

The running total of violent crimes + property crimes as of February 3, 2012 was 19,501.
The current number is 17,546.
This is a 10.5% decrease in violent crimes and property crimes.

By violent crime only as of Feb 3 of respective year
2012: 4,699
2013: 4,142
Decrease: 11.9%

By property crime only as of Feb 3 of respective year
2012: 14,803
2013: 13,314
Decrease: 10.1%

The only numbers in any category to be up are the following
Theft from Person: Three out of five weeks
In total, those three weeks added up to +9. The two weeks there were decrease equaled -6. The total for the year is +3
Rape: Five out of five weeks. What is going on here? The numbers for the five weeks total add up to +48 over last year. That is something else.

Interesting to note that the violent crime rate is down nearly 12% even with the +48 in rapes. The aggravated assault and robberies with guns is down by A LOT. If the rapes were decreased as much as the other categories, we'd be looking at violent crime being down at least 13%, bring the total crime rate down 12 and change percent.

[Cnote11]

I will be the new Frank of this thread, constantly updating you all with news about crime, but in a positive way!

The murder rate has now decreased by 44 percent!!!

We should examine some other numbers first to put this in perspective

At this time in 2010 and 2009 there were 28 murders. There are currently 24 this year. There ended up being 306 and 302 murders in those respective years. Using January and February data to today's date, give or take a few murders in a 2 day span, the approximate murders per month for the years 2010 and 2009 was 19.3 murders per month. This would put the city at 224 murders, but they netted about 80 more murders. 2011 at 40 murders at this time and ended up with 324, which isn't far from 306. So, stating the obvious, it is really quite too early to tell what will happen.

Having said that, IF this year follows the spike pattern with 2010 and 2009 set as the threshold, we can expect to have a year of murders under 300! I'm expecting a 10% decrease in murder--after absorbing the spike pattern from those years--from the lowest year in recent history, which was 2009 with 302 murders. This would be an 18% decrease from last year. That might not be 44%, but it is still really great progress.

Some extra information on per month predictions based off of numbers marked from the current date data
2012 prediction:343
2012 actual: 331
Difference: -12

2011 prediction: 320
2011 actual: 324
Difference: +4

2010 prediction: 224
2010 actual: 306
Difference: +82

2009 prediction: 224
2009 actual: 302
Difference: +78

2008 prediction: 256
2008 actual: 331
Different: +75

2007 prediction: 304
2007 actual: 391
Difference: +87

2013 prediction without absorption: 192
2013 prediction with absorption based on all years with spiked periods: 272/273
Worst case scenario based on recent historical trends: 279

I don't have any data going back past 1988 about murders per year at the moment, but this would be the lowest number of murders in at least 25 years. Only two years came close: 2002 with 288 and 1999 with 296. These were fleeting moments... as the murders always went back up over 300, even recently surpassing 400 in 2006. (392 in 2007 and 375 in 2005)

If we can avoid the spiking of the average of 80 murders of predicted numbers from February in four of the last six years, or at least attempt to cut it in half, we could be looking at something Philadelphia may not have even come close to in decades upon decades. After we accomplish this, we need to take actions to at least stabilize and push forward.

Some quick analysis, albeit superficial at the moment because I'm tired and am going to bed, of mid-year data shows that by the end of August, you should have a stellar idea of what to expect.

[frankgn87]

Port Richmond. Fight between neighbors.. The guy with the guns was a felon too.


Man arrested, barricades himself inside Philly house | 6abc.com

[frankgn87]

I can't believe how excited you guys get over a few less crimes in the city. LOL. Its cold people, everyone stays inside.. Most of the violence happens in the warmer months

The bottom line is the murders are UP over last year, and the year before, and the year before..