Murders not down everywhere

While Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly trumpeted crime declining in the city for the 18th year in row and they expected this year’s murder rate to come in at the second lowest in the city’s history, many neighborhoods in parts of south Queens did not see the same reductions.

In Patrol Borough Queens South, which includes eight police precincts in the southern part of the borough, murders shot up from 43 in all of 2007 to 68 through December 21 of 2008, according to NYPD statistics.

“We have had a rash of murders in the district that are unexplained, which is ridiculous,” said City Councilmember Leroy Comrie, who represents a number of the neighborhoods in south Queens.

Seven out of the eight precincts saw murders increase in 2008 from their numbers in 2007 with only the 105th precinct seeing a decrease in murders. The biggest increase - both percentage wise and in number of murders - occurred in the 102nd precinct with 8 murders occurring in 2008 compared to only one murder in all of 2007, according to NYPD statistics.

Crime down, murders up in south Queens