Montgomery Co. crime rate eclipses neighboring Fairfax
By: Freeman Klopott
February 1, 2010

A Montgomery County Homicide Detective walks in front of a house in Lusby, Md. on Monday, Sept. 29, 2008, where police discovered human remains in a basement freezer. A mother told police that child-sized human remains uncovered in her basement freezer were those of her two adopted daughters and police believe she is responsible for their deaths. (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf)

Montgomery and Fairfax counties are similar is size, population and demographics, but the Maryland county has seen nearly 25 percent more serious crime recently than its neighbor across the Potomac, a study found.

Murders, rapes, assaults, burglaries, and other serious crimes totaled 28,311 in Montgomery County, and 21,319 in Fairfax County in 2008, according to a report released by the Montgomery County Council last week.

The rate of violent crimes in Montgomery is 235 per 100,000 residents, in Fairfax it's 78 per 100,000 residents.

The two counties have a similar demographic breakdown. Fairfax County has a slightly larger population at 1,015,000 compared with Montgomery's 950,680. The median income in Fairfax is higher at $107,075 compared with $93,895 in Montgomery.

Officials and law enforcement policy experts attributed at least a significant part of the crime gap to the counties' treatment of gangs and youth.

In October, the Northern Virginia Gang Task Force released a report detailing its success between 2003 and 2008. The report noted that "many gang members from Northern Virginia are moving or driving to Prince George's and other Maryland counties ... to avoid dealing with police departments that are unrelenting in their efforts to keep gangs under control."

Fairfax County Supervisor Jeff McKay, D-Lee, said the favorable crime numbers in his county traced to heightened police efforts to prevent crime within younger age groups.

In recent years, Fairfax County added more school resource officers and deployed them to middle schools for the first time, McKay said. He added that their presence is the "main reason gang activity is down."

Montgomery County police declined to comment on the statistical difference between them and Fairfax.

Montgomery County Councilman George Leventhal, D-at large, who commissioned the report, said the difference in crime wasn't "alarming." He added, "I'd say it's a challenge."

In Montgomery County gangs have often cropped up in the form of pack robberies -- roaming gangs of youth who rip off people's wallets and cell phones -- instances of which started climbing in late 2007, driving up the county's crime rate.

In 2008, the year covered by the council's report, county jail officials cited pack robberies as the cause of a record high jail population.

One robbery would net three to five arrests of mostly young men between 18 and 25 years old.

Gangs in Montgomery County have also taken violent action. In November 2008, a 14-year-old boy was gunned down on a county bus by an MS-13 gang member. In early 2009, a 15-year-old Hyattsville boy was abducted by 18th Street gang members, who believed he was a member of rival MS-13, and found stabbed to death in Gaithersburg.

Jon Feere, a legal policy analyst for the Center for Immigration Studies, noted that the Montgomery County Council report cited a 12 percent reduction in violent crime in Fairfax County from 2006 to 2008, compared with a 5 percent drop in Montgomery during the same period.

"It is possible that Virginia's statewide efforts at discouraging illegal immigration have resulted in a greater decrease in violent criminal activity, particularly when it comes to the issue of criminal alien gangs like MS-13," Feere said.


fklopott@washingtonexaminer.com

bhughes@washingtonexaminer.com



http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/local ... 80502.html