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County’s crime rate decreased in 2006
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Related Topics: Harford County
Harford County (Map, News) - Harford County’s overall crime rate declined in 2006, despite a growing population and increases in categories such as homicides, rapes and motor vehicle thefts, according to crime data released by the Maryland State Police last week.
The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting statistics released last week showed that Harford County’s crime rate — the number of crimes compared with the population — had decreased by 4 percent between 2005 and 2006 even as the population grew about 1.2 percent.
In 2006, Harford had a rate of 2,327.9 victims of crime per every 100,000 residents — lower than the Maryland crime rate of 4,159.2 victims per 100,000, state police said.
County Sheriff Jesse Bane said he could offer no explanation for the drop since he had retired from his post in the office between the beginning of the year and being elected as sheriff, but said he hoped to continue the downward trend with better intelligence and tracking efforts.
Harford’s homicides increased 350 percent, jumping from only two in 2005 to nine in 2006. So far this year, Harford has had only one homicide.
“I believe the homicide rate would be higher this year if we hadn’t been on top of gang problems,” Bane said. “Our intelligence points us to areas where we believe gang problems are growing and could turn violent, and we’ve flooded those areas with officers and covert work.”
Motor vehicle theft grew 21.7 percent in 2006, and Bane said he was addressing incidents this year by identifying problem areas to be given special priority.
The sheriff’s office is implementing ComStat, a program for tracking crime data near-continuously to identify patterns and trends — a large-scale version of the tactic he has been pursuing, Bane said.
“We’ve done things over the course of the year similar to ComStat: We look for a pattern, and once it’s identified we’re able to address the problem,” he said.
msantoni@baltimoreexaminer.com
Comments from Examiner Readers
9:48 AM MST on Tue., Aug. 21, 2007 re: "Sheriff: Report fails to show entire picture"
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Examiner Reader said:
Read through the lines. All this article is about is a Sheriff trying to discredit good things that are happening in a county. The UCR is the most accurate means of analying serious crime for mostpolice departments in the U.S..... They are just trying to expand their department by discrediting other's good work and this is the only way they know how to do it! The people in Carroll County think that they pay alot for the MSP, wait until they get a county police force - then they will really pay no matter what this guy says - just look at the property taxes and expenses in other counties.
136 agree | 121 disagree
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Concerned Resident said:
It sounds as if the State Police have adjusted the crime stats to save their outdated resident trooper program ! Doesnt crime go up when they want more money for troopers in Carroll County ?
148 agree | 131 disagree
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Annapolis Defense Attorney said:
Yeah don't and don't forget about all of those bong cases that go unreported each year! Thank God we pay taxes to the police to stop those horrible criminals.
170 agree | 127 disagree
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Examiner Reader said:
500 or 1,000 more poilce officers will not help. The base problem is lack of respect, which starts in the home. Once the population realizes that the police and teachers can not be the parents to your kids, this whole sad situation may turn around.
164 agree | 153 disagree
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Examiner Reader said:
Could it be Management? Has anyone asked that question? Now that we have looked at numbers let's look at the quality of the leadership. At this point it is not about how many police, it is about what they are doing. Where is the strategic plan? That is why Mitchell's plan of the three Mayoral contenders is so weak. These folks can't get think outside of the box, and the entire city is suffering.
169 agree | 154 disagree
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Examiner Reader said:
Clearly, based on the above article, it is not that we have too few police. Other cities have close to the same number in proportion to their population but less crime and homicide. This tells me that the policedepartment is malfunctioning. Before we get more officers we need to put the ones we have to good use.
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Examiner Reader said:
Kareem Timmons was an ex-boyfriend of mine about 10 years ago. I miss him and loved him dearly. He was a very kind hearted person.
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