Crime in NY continues downward trend

These forums have become the place where the frustrated, underachievers in NY come to 1 up each other with more negative news.

People have been watching too many of the Debbie Downer skits on SNL.

past performance should never be used as an indicator of future perfomance. The naysayers like myself have a point since crime in most other major cities has increased. So it's not like I am pulling predictions out of my ass, but rather I am watching the overall trends in other cities.

crime is not a function of falling prices for co-ops....falling prices may correlate with depression, excess drinking, spousal and child abuse but not crime.

This thread was supposed to bait rufus. What happened?

The criminals lost their jobs and had to move elsewhere...

I could not agree mor...............wait a minute!

WHERES MY WALLET!

I think that people are so brusied and beaten financially that the general attitude has become more compassionate and people are alert and more friendly... like post 9/11...

Uh...yeah. People are nicer. That's it. That's why things are different than recession of '91, late 70s,etc. Nothing to do with fact that we now have 35,000 cops (twice 1970s level), we've been catching and prosecuting more violent criminals and sentencing them to longer prison terms since the mid-1990s, more cold cases of the most violent and serious type are being solved with DNA data banks, COMPSTAT actually works, prosecuting quality-of-life offenses actually does keep serious crime from ticking up, current NYPD/DA illegal gun initiatives, etc.

The truth is that NYC revolutionized crime fighting in the 1990s and built on those successes since the turn of the century. And it isn't just NYPD. NYC prosecutors have never been as on the ball across all counties as they have been in the last 15 years.

Has anyone actually looked at the homicide stats this year? Even law enforcement can't believe how low they are. For months on here I've read doomsday predictions of rampant crime waves. It may go up, and if you say something long enough it may one day come true, but there's been a recession for something like 2 years now and NYC is seeing crime go DOWN.

Crime is NOT increasing in other cities uniformly. And As we know from other threads Alpine,the crime stats you used to argue this point are from 2006 - BEFORE the real estate downturn.

'The truth is that NYC revolutionized crime fighting in the 1990s and built on those successes since the turn of the century. And it isn't just NYPD. NYC prosecutors have never been as on the ball across all counties as they have been in the last 15 years.'

I give the credit to 'abortion on demand' legislature of the 1970's.
Follow the stats so from the best selling book, "Freakonomics".
It appears that the bulk of the quality of life criminals never made it past the goalie!
This more than any other issue will keep city crime to a reasonable level, even under significant economic stress.
Now the suberbs with their newly minted suberban slums should have quite a go of it.

Well, as Freakonomics, Tipping Point, and every other book with a theory on the topic has pointed out, crime started falling ALL OVER the US in the 90s, not just in NYC. It fell by more in NYC than most large US cities, but there are other places with totally different police regimes than NYC with similarly high drops in crime. Not 100% sure of any of the theories, but whatever happened, it happneded nation-wide.

Freakanomics says legal abortion is the biggest reason crime dropped.

They also imprisoned anyone with more than a drop of drugs in their possession. That's not working so well for the municipalities' budgets these days.

for all you crime experts out there. the police commissioner himself had addressed the issue

http://www.nypost.com/seven/04302009/postopinion/opedcolumnists/crimes_plunge____amid_sour_economy_166832.htm

Aboutready, you couldn't be more wrong. Your opinion is the type promoted and hyped by groups with agendas you don't begin to understand.

Virtually no one in NYC was imprisoned for having a "drop of drugs" on them. Across the city, diversion programs have been in place for years. Any first time offender who wanted treatment received it. Out patient treatment programs of all varieties abounded. Your idealized vision of those involved in narcotics probably doesn't jibe with reality: many drug offenders actually CHOOSE jail over a program because they have no desire to stop using and don't want to risk longer jail that comes from failing a court ordered program.

Second time offenders are again offered programs. Often residential. This sorry lot got themselves addicted to drugs and for whatever reason it is society's job to get them off drugs so they don't kill themselves, engage in criminal activity to support their self-destructions, don't invite violence that follows drugs into neighborhoods where decent people are struggling to make livings and raise children. Drugs are a "victimless" crime until the dealer and buyer start doing business on the route your kid takes to school or a related shooting kills an innocent passer by. I digress. The residential treatment programs are passed by many. But many fail. They don't get rewarded for failing. Many are given a third and forth chance, though. After that, they get punished. At some point, there is a consequence to their actions.

Third and fourth offenders may not be offered treatment, because they obviously don't benefit from it and there are many other people who actually want the slots in the programs. They go to jail. What would you suggest be done with them?

And do you know how many crimes were solved by people arrested for drugs ratting out major criminals in return for leniency? Major drug operations, organized crimes, homicides.

Your simplistic view of the treatment of drug offenders belies the damage done by many ill-informed groups peddling bad information to the public. The recent drug reform laws are a mess, passed by people who haven't a clue as to how the real world operates for the people the pretend to help. Prosecutors weren't consulted on the legislation, the NYS senate democrats didn't really weigh in, the governor was silent. The new law was passed because it was shoved into the state budget bill and legislators couldn't vote against the budget bill.

Thank you Sheldon Silver for another mangling of good public policy to leave NY worse off under your so-called leadership. The Dems up in Albany are practically storming the bastille and that worries me more about criminal justice than any economic news.

drug-related imprisonment went from 40,000 inmates in the middle 80s to over 500,000 today.

federal judges despise the sentencing laws.

wait till the unemployment runs out for the crime increases. give it another year. rest assured crime in NYC WILL increase. especcially as the city cuts summer employment programs for school kids, etc.

I wish I could find the graph (from maybe three years ago in some magazine or another) that showed the phenomenal decline in the total US mental-health inpatient population over 20 years or so, and the nearly exact inverse line showing phenomenal increase in the total US prison population over the same years.

It's one of the most beautiful artworks of our time, but it purports to be based on fact rather than artifice.

Kyle, I'm surprised that you'd paste your own monologue on two different threads within minutes of one another. By the way, are you an ADA?

alanhart, it was almost enough to have me give up my ACLU membership.

I can't find the date on this study, but it's from the 2000s. I saw a very good one the other day that I'm still looking for. obviously the Beckley foundation is biased, so I'll look for some good international organization study/report that says the same thing.

http://www.beckleyfoundation.org/seminar/Proceedings_5/Dr_Stevens.pdf

by the way, I realize the beckley foundation report disagrees with my own point that imprisonment is related to a reduction in crime, although it shows a small but significant reduction in the 1-3% range.

this is not what I was looking for, btw. just presenting here, not opining, so don't load the hate on me for this:

http://www.criminal-law-lawyer-source.com/articles/cocaine-sentencing-guidelines.html

I happen to believe that the sentencing disparity was appropriate, because crack is way more destructive than everyday kitchen-cupboard coke. It's foolish to equalize them in a symbolic effort to make things "fair" between the economic classes.

alanhart, i have also before mentioned my horrible memories of those crack days. The following I have more difficulties with:

http://www.nyclu.org/files/MARIJUANA-ARREST-CRUSADE_Final.pdf

Do the perceived ends always justify the means? This is the NYCLU, and I haven't taken a look at the raw data sources, but the statistics are rather compelling.

I agree with comments re: mental health system failures and increase in prison pop. By some estimates about 50% of prisoners are seriously mentally ill. In the 1970s there was a huge push to "free" mental health patients from horrible facilities. The push coincided with awful recession. Result, empty institutions, mentally ill on the streets, no help for them or at least not enough. That alone didn't account for crime increase (crack did play a role along with host of other factors). But it was sure a huge contributor.

As for federal sentencing, the mandatory guidelines are essentially gone now, but they were indeed atrocious. Federal law generally is much, much harsher on criminals than NYS law.

It was the "prison for a drop of drugs" statement that got me going. I think we are probably closer on many issues surrounding drugs than this thread suggests.

It is very likely that powdered vs. crack cocaine disparities in sentencing are coming to an end at the federal level anyway.

Someone has to send the paper about marijuana arrest crusade to Obama asap. Unveliavable.

what kylewest says I see all the time - my guess is that he is in fact an ADA

don't forget the cameras filming people everywhere

look, you know crime is down when the NYPD dreams up "programs" where they do things like place a laptop bag at a busstop and have eight plainclothes cops standing by watching and waiting for someone to pick it up so they can rush in and best 'em

In hard times like these days a lot of white-collar crime in finance surfaces

Bernie Madoff style crimes

now this about Public Pension Plans

Mr. Cuomo said a preliminary review by his office found that as many as half of the intermediaries in pension fund transactions in New York State and New York City were not properly licensed and registered with a broker-dealer, as required by federal securities laws. Failing to register could violate both federal securities laws and the Martin Act, a sweeping state securities law.

“The troubling pattern of unlicensed agents highlights yet another systemic weakness in New York’s pension fund, creating a situation which is fraught with peril and prone to abuse,” Mr. Cuomo said in a statement.

lowery, I know it was a typo, but I like that you wrote "best 'em", as in commit a bigger crime than stealing a laptop bag!

Okeh, I'm done picking on cops for today. Sorry.

In the aftermath of Lehman's failure and the ensuing credit crisis, a lot of people on here predicted that as NYC sufferred a recession, crime would spike and increased violence would add to a decline in NYC RE values. As the weeks and months passed and crime didn't go up, the dooms-dayers said just wait until unemployment numbers rose more, they pointed to a jump in muggings in the 6th Precinct, they said, "Just wait! You'll see." Some of us disagreed (well, I at least strongly disagreed) for reasons I expressed early in this thread.

So I thought that now, as it is just about 2010--more than a year into the post-Lehman era--we might return to the topic for a moment and check the accuracy of the dooms-dayers. They contribute endlessly on here with virtually no accountability and everytime a market indicator contradicts an end-of-the-world prediction, the dooms-dayers say the indicator is wrong, just wait and see.

So where are we on the crime doom and gloom? We are a safer city than ever. Even safer than in 2007. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/30/nyregion/30crime.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=crime%20statistics&st=cse

Search "crime" in Streeteasy discussions and see who it was predicting Armageddon in all those threads. Many are the same people posting one after another link to supposed doomsday articles and headlines on here day after day. Having been so wrong about crime, its remarkable to see how utterly un-chastened they are in their willingness to continue spewing predictions about the economy and RE. They're like weathermen who get it wrong as often as they get it right and yet just keep chattering hoping the audience is still listening.

"By some estimates about 50% of prisoners are seriously mentally ill."

I think everyone(in prison and out) is somewhat "mentally ill." Poverty and bad luck allows mental illness to run amok.

Wow! What you don't know about mental illness is plenty.

kw, a couple of weeks ago i read somewhere that one of the reasons for the recent decrease in property crimes (nationally) is actually the increased unemployment rate. seems that so many people are out of work and at home that they are providing a natural defense against burglary. must find the silver linings where one can.

Yes please educate me on mental illness. Let's start with a defintion for it. (we have years to discuss it)

"These forums have become the place where the frustrated, underachievers in NY come to 1 up each other with more negative news."

Nah, its just the place where the bulls, having been proven painfully wrong and completely illogical, are resorting to fighting the only thing they can handle... strawmen arguments.

truthskr 10, I was really stunned when I read what you wrote that everyone is somewhat "mentally ill". I don't think that you can be a little mentally ill just like you can't be a little pregnant- you're pregnant or you're not. Mental illness is such a debilitating disease and has a tremendous impact on the person and their family and friends. It just stunned me what you wrote.

I don't know if I agree with that. I've always known mental illness to be about imbalance... that the folks with problems have much more severe versions of what "normal" would have. Where manic depressive in "normal" people is called moods, etc.

So the bears who were predicting a 50-70% drop in prices were correct? I don't think so . . .

Somwhereelse, I think that mental illness often goes way beyond an exaggerated version of normalcy. Severely mentally ill persons have great difficulty functioning in regular society and often can't survive without alot of assistance mainly from family. Mental illness is much more than being in a very bad mood. And unfortuantely, not every mentally ill person can take a pill and be cured. Many people suffer from treatment resistant depression or bipolar disease. It's a very very hard life often lived with little companionship and support.

In any event, it's certainly not my place to, as truthskr states, "educate" SE posters on mental illness, a topic very far removed from real estate, the subject of this board, so I'll move on.

aboutready
kw, a couple of weeks ago i read somewhere that one of the reasons for the recent decrease in property crimes (nationally) is actually the increased unemployment rate. seems that so many people are out of work and at home that they are providing a natural defense against burglary. must find the silver linings where one can.

Although there is an increase in the number of toilet seats breaking at home as people use their bathrooms at home vs. at work.

Crime rates generally don't change rapidly in the upward direction. It can take a decade for the effects of economic issues to cause significant change in crime rates. Fortunately, for some reason, the opposite isn't true: rapi8dly rising economies seem to have crime rates drop a lot faster. I think one of the reasons for this is for significant rises in crime, you need to "breed new criminals", whereas if someone can make a decent living without committing a crime..... well. In addition, the "stress related to finances" crimes (spousal abuse for example) take longer to start occurring than people stopping stealing car radios when other means of getting small amounts of money are plentiful.

{NB ALL of the above is WAY out of my field of expertise and is purely opinion}

"seems that so many people are out of work and at home that they are providing a natural defense against burglary." ... we in Harlem use drug dealers to keep burglary and street crime down to about the level of an Iowa corn-rearing town. Very effective.

The Manhattan District Attorney's office tries to boost street crime and burglary in Harlem by removing the low-level drug dealers, but truth and light prevail.

Excelsior!

Interesting that no one has tried to refute kylewest, presumably because he's absolutely right about what the doomsayers said about crime and how little (i.e., approximately none) of it has come to pass. All those posts about New York going striaght back to the 1970s and all the professionals and families moving out were pretty funny, though, so thanks kw for the trip down SE memory lane.

30_yrs, are you saying, "Just wait! You'll see"? It sounds like it.

30yrs:Ireally disagree with your post here. Your speculation about spousal abuse taking years to develop after a downturn is pretty baseless. Also not sure what you mean about downturn causing crime upswing 10 years later...like the 1991 recession caused a spike in 2001? Huh? The traditional thinking was bad economy = more crime. Period. Not after x years of bad economy. That "common wisdom" is proven wrong so far. Why? For the reasons I stated at the beginning of this thread, among others.

My point in reviving this was to point out that A LOT OF PEOPLE WITH LOTS OF OPINIONS ON HERE ARE OFTEN WRONG, blow things out of proportion, lack perspective, and seem to just get off on wringing their hands about the sky falling day in and day out. And when these people are starkly shown to be wrong, they simply ignore whatever they said and just post something else like Obama giving the "worst" speech ever. Give me a break.

I could revive 1/2 dozen "there'll be more crime" threads from the last 14 months full of comments by the board's most prolific naysayers. What do they have to say about the fact that crime hasn't skyrocketed despite 10 % unemployment? Nothing. It's pathetic.

Why is this significant? Because 1/2 the threads here in the last months seem to be end-of-the-world posts by Riversider or threads about how ALL positive news and developments are wrong. Here's an example of something that is good and look what gets posted! Jibberish and nonsense.

disagreement with the always negative always entitled people will only earn you universal scorn.

> So the bears who were predicting a 50-70% drop in prices were correct? I don't think so . . .

Wow, you know LIC has lost the argument when his strawman goes to 70% down.

ROTFL

"SEE, WE DIDN'T GO DOWN 70%! SO THE BULLS WERE RIGHT!".

Lame....

"Somwhereelse, I think that mental illness often goes way beyond an exaggerated version of normalcy. Severely mentally ill persons have great difficulty functioning in regular society and often can't survive without alot of assistance mainly from family. Mental illness is much more than being in a very bad mood. And unfortuantely, not every mentally ill person can take a pill and be cured. Many people suffer from treatment resistant depression or bipolar disease. It's a very very hard life often lived with little companionship and support. "

I'm not sure why you think your statements are evidence of your claim. They aren't.

Difficuly functioning, needing assistance, pills not being a cure, hard life.... none of those are any evidence that mental disorders are not gross exaggerations of normal functional balance.

Its funny that you say "bipolar disease". Its actually biplar disorder... that something isn't in, well, order.

Or, how about this...

bipolar disorder = "the presence of one or more episodes of abnormally elevated mood clinically referred to as mania or..."

Sort of an open and shut case, no?
Its right there in the description....

I wonder if rufus ever got the lobotomy that I recommended he seek out at one of Chicago's many fine lobotomiums. Lobotomia?

http://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/16834/1/MPRA_paper_16834.pdf

hey, alamefart, did you get columbiacounty's permission before you posted that?

i don't think any of us has any idea what might be in store for us in terms of reductions in services, etc. i haven't read of much regarding NYC yet, but i've heard of a number of places reducing services for addiction, mental illness, parole monitoring and other social services (including CPS) that would seem to be even more vital during an extended downturn. i have no wish for increased crime. decreased property values certainly aren't worth that. but i'm not going to assume it couldn't occur as a result of local budgets being so compromised. let's hope it doesn't.

aboutready
i don't think any of us has any idea what might be in store for us in terms of reductions in services, etc.

just imagine, the toilet is stopped up and there is no super with a plunger ...

"i don't think any of us has any idea what might be in store for us in terms of reductions in services, etc...i'm not going to assume it couldn't occur as a result of local budgets being so compromised."

Translation: "Just wait! You'll see". No one wants to come right out and say it. Weak.

Please refrain from sharing your fractured sexual fantasies with us, hf-scumm.

sls, are you willing to say it? i'm not. i have no idea of whether or not the administration will come forward with an aid package for the states. our revenues are scarily low, and that could have some serious negative implications, particularly if unemployment remains elevated through 2010 and property values dip again.

but we've made it this far without a spike in crime, i can only hope we continue to see the same. it's not a just wait, you'll see in the slightest.

alamefart, what is is like to have no sexual organs?

aboutready, you talk about unemployment as if you are a disinterested Ivy Tower academician.

When was the last time you were employed?

"Wow, you know LIC has lost the argument when his strawman goes to 70% down."

This was definitely stated - it's by no means a strawman, even if it came from a relatively small minority of doomers.

kylewest, amen.

"sls, are you willing to say it?" No, I'm willing to say the opposite, which is that it won't happen.

kylewest slam-dunked the doomsayers with his post earlier today and the people who can't accept that the world isn't ending are now dancing around the question putting down markers like "It can take a decade for the effects of economic issues to cause significant change in crime rates" and "our revenues are scarily low, and that could have some serious negative implications, particularly if unemployment remains elevated through 2010 and property values dip again" so that if there is some little blip in some crime statistic anytime in the foreseeable future they can come back and say. "See, I predicted it." As I said, weak.

And by the way, what does property value potentially dipping again have to do with the outlook for crime? I need some help on the cause and effect there.

property values dipping can lead to more foreclosures which can lead to more empty homes which can lead to more crime. not in prime manhattan, but certainly elsewhere in the city.

but to your point about coming back and saying see i predicted it, it's really not in my nature to gloat. and i'd see nothing to gloat about under those circumstances. i hope that there will be no increase in crime, and we've certainly not seen any thus far. but i am one of those individuals who doesn't think our economy is on very strong ground, and i think our local government may be in a world of hurt over the next couple of years. but i'm happy that you're so certain that there won't be any effect.

somewhereelse, you and I obviously have different ideas about the issue of mental illness. I really don't want to argue or even discuss in depth this issue on a real estate site because it's likely not of much interest to most of the people who post here. I certainly respect your opinion and we don't have to agree on this subject.

"but i'm happy that you're so certain that there won't be any effect." No, I'm saying that there won't be a massive crime wave, now or in the years to come, triggered by the economic downturn. There may be modest increases that still leave crime levels well below the levels of the not to distant past. Further, I'm predicting that at some point in the future spotty statistics will be cherry-picked by SE doom-and-gloomers to attempt to "prove" that there is a crime wave, with the economy asserted at the (ultimately unprovable) cause.

"I certainly respect your opinion and we don't have to agree on this subject." . . . somewhereelse will never ever agree that you don't have to agree on this or any other subject. Just watch!

;)

Thanks Alan, I've been trying to get a handle on the personalities of the more frequent SE posters and I certainly don't want to get into a lengthy discussion about a subject so far removed from real estate. Have a nice evening.

And also, "sls, are you willing to say it? i'm not" But you already did.

Let's take a bit closer look: "our revenues are scarily low, and that could have some serious negative implications, particularly if unemployment remains elevated through 2010 and property values dip again"

First, elevated unemployment in 2010 is a foregone conclusion

Second, I think it highly likely that property values fall further. Some will disagree but I doubt you will be among them

Please advise if you disagree with either of these premises, because abouready making a bullish call on unemployment or real estate prices would be the headline of the month on SE.

So the conditions are going to be satisfied for your "seriously negative implications,” which I take to mean that you are predicting a substantial increase in crime. What else could it mean in the context of this thread?

no, sls, quit trying to put words in my mouth. seriously negative implications could include many things, including increased substance abuse, etc. it could also include an increase in crime. whether it will and to what extent i have repeatedly said i do not know. i have merely said that there is no way to predict what will happen given the situation.

i don't disagree with either conclusion. therefore i think our city's funds will be hit fairly badly. but unlike some others i am willing to admit i can't predict all. and as unlikely as it seems to me now, the federal government may provide significant aid to the states. we're absolutely broke, but that hasn't stopped the outflows yet. and i'd think it's obvious that large amounts of aid could prevent much of the reduction in services. so shoot me for saying i don't have a friggin' clue, but could see more than one possible outcome.

AR, thanks for clarifying. My comments were based on the assumption, which you have helpfully made clear was incorrect, that your posts about nebulous but dire consequences had something to do with the actual topic of this thread. Now that I understand that they were just off-topic randomness, I stand corrected.

lobster
My comment was both facetious and serious.
You've painted mental illness with a very short stroke.
Here's a report stating 1 in 4 americans have mental illness.
My own layman opinion and certainly subject to ridicule if anyone wants to indulge is Mental Illness is like lactose intolerance, everybody is, it's just a matter of are you 4% lactose intolerant or 80%.
Various triggers can up that percentage, especially poverty and bad luck.
Now I realize maybe you are talking about just those with severe mental illness, the serial killers, those with no frontal lobe activity (empathy). All I'm saying is don't underestimate the triggers in all of us.

forgot the link(not that it is that important)

http://health.dailynewscentral.com/content/view/973/62

"forgot the link" ... Attention Deficit Disorder, World Health Organization ICD-10

"kylewest slam-dunked the doomsayers with his post earlier today and the people who can't accept that the world isn't ending are now dancing around the question putting down markers like "It can take a decade for the effects of economic issues to cause significant change in crime rates" and "our revenues are scarily low, and that could have some serious negative implications, particularly if unemployment remains elevated through 2010 and property values dip again" so that if there is some little blip in some crime statistic anytime in the foreseeable future they can come back and say. "See, I predicted it." As I said, weak."

Hillarious. We officially have the biggest RE crash on record, the longest and deepest recession since the great depression, highest unemployment since who knows when (and increasing), yadda, yadda...

and yet still the folks who said there would be no crash still yelling "we were right, the world didn't end".

The strawman argument lives on.

[sigh]...someone else who didn't read the title of the thread. Why is SE such a magnet for people with reading comprehension issues?

so, somewhereelse, when are they going to be shooting Blade Runner II in New York? Do give me a heads-up, please, me so I know when to go out and buy my bullet-proof vest.

wrong movie, sls. think snake.

and my reading comprehension is just fine.

truthskr, I am truly sorry if you believe that all persons with serious mental illness are serial killers and/or lack empathy for others. I can't really respond to such a comment. But as I mentioned earlier, it's not my place on a real estate website to discuss with anonymous bloggers the complicated topic of mental illness. I don't know what your personal and non-newspaper article dealings with mentally ill persons are, if indeed you have any. Again I reacted too sharply to your initial comment and would like to deal solely with real estate matters on this website.

lobster

??? Ok, I am certain there is a doctor somewhere that would read our conversation and conclude we are both mentally ill.

I am not sure exactly where I said that "I believe that ALL persons with serious mental illness are serial killers and/or lack empathy for others."

In the spirit of recent posters quoting movies, "What we have here, is a failure to communicate."

And if you read the link, in particular the paragraph;
"Severity was divided into three levels: serious, which might be defined by criteria including a serious suicide attempt or substantial work limitations as result of the disorder; moderate, which might defined by criteria including suicide ideation or substance abuse without serious impairment of functioning; and mild."

Clearly, to use your analogy,you could be "a little pregnant."

I'm just here for RE too.

Truthskr, I'm not sure how to interpret your comment about being a little pregnant, but I'll try to see it in an amusing fashion. It is rather odd to interact with strangers on a website and I can see that from time to time, people will say things that are offensive to others. Hope that you enjoy the rest of your day.

lobster
I don't wish to argue either. It's just frustration with trying to communicate with you.For whatever reason, I'm determined. LOL.
You said , "I don't think you can be a little mentally ill." and you used "being a little pregnant" as an analogy.But as the article states there are different levels of mental illness including "mild."
Do you still not see the correlation of "a little pregnant" and "mildly mentally ill?

And I leave you with one more thing to ponder. If you found your self in jail, is it possible you might be depressed? Suicidal?

I'll post the paragraph again;

"Severity was divided into three levels: serious, which might be defined by criteria including a serious suicide attempt or substantial work limitations as result of the disorder; moderate, which might defined by criteria including suicide ideation or substance abuse without serious impairment of functioning; and mild."

Now is it not possible there are more mentally ill people in jail because jail made them mentally ill???

On the original topic of crime, NYC still remains relatively safe and I'm happy for it.
I remember the very early 90's and that was no fun.
Though I do notice an uptick in the NY Post's manhattan blotter section of violent crime south of 96th street.
My question to all you fellow posters; How big a role do you think technology (in particular,digital cameras, terrorism awareness,etc.) has played in keeping our crime at bay?

It all depends on the arresting officer's discretion. And if the numbers are supposed to go down, they can go down. Drunk guy threatens you on the street - harassment or disorderly conduct? In 2009 it's disorderly conduct, or so it seems.

Someone breaks into your house while you are gone - attempted burglary or criminal trespassing? Same.

I'm not a lawyer so don't call me on the distinctions, but this is how in some cases, crime can "go down".

"so, somewhereelse, when are they going to be shooting Blade Runner II in New York? Do give me a heads-up, please, me so I know when to go out and buy my bullet-proof vest."

Sure. I assume you'll be the one sitting on the bench reading "strawmen arguments for dummies".

;-)

Good one. Got a laugh out of that myself.

Good point Npsherm. Are there any other fans of the greatest show in TV history "The Wire" on SE? Refusal to "juke the stats" in the ways you cited was the downfall of the saintly Lt/Colonel/Commisioner Cedric Daniels.

Mayhem in the city: 25 people shot in 48 hours
Three killed Sunday after three were killed Saturday. One of the wounded includes an 11-year-old girl who will never walk again.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/25-people-shot-48-hours-article-1.1361388#ixzz2VCzb8IYm

http://nypost.com/2013/09/10/hard-up-police-academy-instructor-swipes-shoes-from-dsw/

Crime is going to go up with the end of stop and frisk.

now with de blasio in the running and possibly winning the mayoral race -I shudder to think what he will do to keep crime rates down.

Crime won't necessarily go up when Stop and Frisk ends. There are other ways of effectively policing without infringing on peoples rights.

"There are other ways of effectively policing without infringing on peoples rights," yeah....like "stand your ground."

They might be able to use a device that would scan someone for concealed weapons.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/18/nypd-gun-detection-device_n_1213813.html

just another idea: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/20/opinion/better-ways-to-police-than-stop-and-frisk.html

EW YORK (CBSNewYork) — The NYPD says thugs are beating and mugging bike riders on a popular Manhattan bike path.

The victim of one attack recently came forward to tell fellow riders to be on guard, CBS 2’s Don Champion reported Tuesday.

The bike path along the Hudson River is popular with New Jersey bikers who take the route and cross the George Washington Bridge to get home at night in the dark.

http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2013/09/03/warning-issued-to-bicyclists-in-nyc-gang-attacking-riders-along-the-hudson/

>The bike path along the Hudson River is popular with New Jersey bikers

Seems like an issue for Chris Christie

"just another idea: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/20/opinion/better-ways-to-police-than-stop-and-frisk.html"

Focused deterence? Maybe in a city like Baltimore, where it's just east and west side.
New York has too many enterprises going on at once.

How about legalizing drugs by the train yards.
We can call it New Hamsterdam.

truthskr: lol!

Look, all I am saying is that there are other ways to keep crime down without violating peoples 4th amendment rights.

Crime has been falling in almost ALL of the US's largest cities for the past decade, and in fact has fallen in some cities by more than in NYC. NYC used to be THE safest large city. Now its just #8 or so. And so stop and frisk is not "better" than whatever other cities are doing. This is a national trend.

What's interesting is Bloomberg poo-poos inequality, saying this is a national trend.

http://streeteasy.com/nyc/talk/discussion/36461-bloomberg-most-crime-in-se-bronx-central-bklyn

>And so stop and frisk is not "better" than whatever other cities are doing.

Stop and Frisk is in the neighborhoods with the most crime.

>Now its just #8 or so.

If you look at the areas of NYC that most SE readers are focused on, we would be well ahead of #8.

"If you look at the areas of NYC that most SE readers are focused on, we would be well ahead of #8."

That's absurd. If you cherry picked West Hollywood to Santa Monica in LA County you'd get much lower crime than LA county as a whole.

And stop and frisk in NYC does NOT correspond with actual NYC crime rates. Plenty of areas in the city with relatively high "serious" crime rates like Chelsea and the West Village get very little stop and frisk, while places like Washington Heights that have VERY low crime rates get a lot more.

"...But there were more revelations in store. As it turned out, many of the report's lowest-ranking neighborhoods were in parts of Manhattan not typically associated with crime.

...

Greenwich Village and the Meatpacking District are among the city's most expensive and desirable neighborhoods, but they come in second to last, at No. 68. Blame the thieves: property crime is by far the area's biggest crime concern. Factor out those offenses, and the Village's ranking rises to No. 32. Yet that's still below Inwood and Washington Heights, and even lower than Morris Heights in the Bronx...

Morris Heights and Mount Hope (No. 27) rank higher than all but four neighborhoods in Manhattan. High Bridge (No. 39) has a lower crime rate than Park Slope (No. 41). Melrose and Morrisania (No. 45) edge out Williamsburg, and are now among the city's fastest growing neighborhoods..."

http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/crime-safety-report