Police Blotter: Crime Increased In 2011

As we start 2012 let's look at crime trends over time and by location in the city, using data from the San Leandro Police Department’s crime statistics page.

In a nutshell, crime was up in 2011 from a historic low in the prior year. The precise increase isn’t known because data for the current year is only available through the end of November.

In terms of geography, the statistics show that southwest San Leandro had the fewest serious crimes in 2011. The southeast neighborhoods that include mall see the most crime.

Some attached PDF files will help you visualize the situation and provide additional material for you to scrutinize.

Crime is trending up after a dip

The overarching trend is revealed in the five-year chart above. It shows November-to-November statistics. That allows us to make an apples-to-apples comparison in January, before the December data become available.

As can be seen, the crime rate dipped for several years and is now trending up.

Police Chief Sandra Spagnoli said as much in . Why crime dropped is a mystery. Similar dips happened statewide. Spagnoli predicted that new state policies to reduce prison overcrowding would likely exacerbate the crime increase in 2012 and beyond.

A detailed list of crimes by month, year and type of crime can be found here (click on the first link on that page; that data is also reproduced as the first PDF with this article).

As can be seen, increases in 2011 included two of the most serious crimes, rape and murder.

Eleven rapes were reported to police in all of 2010 whereas 18 had been reported as of the end of November 2011.

In 2010 four murders occurred in San Leandro. In 2011, there were seven murders. They included the in October outside a warehouse party on Alvarado Street. That incident claimed the life of San Leandro High sophomore .

The in the parking lot of the Walmart on Hesperian Boulevard, and just before Christmas, were not statistically significant.

Nevertheless the Black Friday shooting, in particular, cast San Leandro in an unfavorable light on the national stage.

Defining some terms

Most of the incidents in police databases are crimes involving property, some of which — arson and auto theft — are well understood.

A few definitions would help in perusing the attached data for trends for each type of crime, all of which are up slightly:

Larceny involves the taking of property without use of force. Larcenies account for about half of all crimes.

Robbery is a theft that involves force or the fear of force and requires a face-to-face confrontation.

Burglary involves breaking into a premises to commit a theft. In 2010 there were about 53 burglaries per month in San Leandro. With 11 months of data in 2011, there were 54 burglaries per month.

Simple assault is a fight that does not involve a weapon or serious injury. Aggravated assaults are cases where weapons or injuries are present.

Crime breakdowns by geography

San Leandro is rare if not unique among local cities, Spagnoli told the council in her recent report, because it breaks down its statistics by city council district to give residents a more precise look at where crime occurs. (Visit this page and click on appropriate link.)

There are six city council districts. Click on the attached map (it is a JPEG) if you are not sure of your district. The area around BayFair comprises a seventh crime zone for statistical purposes. A police spokesman said malls attract crime, mostly larcenies, and the department didn’t want to lump them into a council district.

Numerically, by far the safest place to live in 2011 was the southwest corner of San Leandro in the fourth district represented by Councilwoman Joyce Starosciak, where 297 crimes were reported as of November.

Here are the crime stats for the other the other six zones — the five council districts plus BayFair — as of the end of November, from lowest to highest:

• 404 incidents were reported in the BayFair zone, three quarters of which were larcenies.
• 516 crimes were reported in the third district, which is located in the heart of the city and is represented by Councilwoman Diana Souza. Those figures include three murders.
• 574 crimes were reported in the first district, the east-central slice of San Leandro represented by Vice Mayor Michael Gregory. They included one murder.
• 587 crimes were reported in the fifth district in the northeast corner of San Leandro that is represented by Councilwoman Pauline Cutter.
• 633 crimes were reported in the second district in the city’s southeast corner represented by Councilwoman Ursula Reed. This area includes BayFair and so, by some reckoning, is the most crime-intensive part of San Leandro.
• 678 crimes were reported on the city’s northwest flank in the sixth district represented by Councilman Jim Prola. 

An attached PDF contains all the data so far published on the crime breakdowns by council district. In the chart, "BF" stands for BayFair. 

Visualize crime around your home

Police department data also allows you to look at crime by neighborhood.

To do so visit the department's statistics page and then click on the link labeled, "Crime reports by neighborhood."

That takes you to a different crime database.

Put your address into the box that appears on that page and play around with the dates. For example, do you want the last three days or the last 30?

The database will give you an interactive map of where crime occurred and what sorts of crimes were reported around your home.

Now what?

So there are some numbers and some tools. Crime is up, generally. What is the situation in your neighborhood? How do you explain it? Does it alarm you? Most importantly:  What, if anything, can the city or citizens do to reverse the trend?

Let us know in the comments and vote in the Patch poll.

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