Thread: San Francisco sees major drop in homicides

San Francisco sees major drop in homicides

By The Associated Press
Tuesday, December 29, 2009 at 2:17 p.m.

SAN FRANCISCO — San Francisco appears on track in 2009 to have the lowest murder rate in nearly 50 years.

Mayor Gavin Newsom and Police Chief George Gascon announced Tuesday homicides in the city have dropped from 98 in 2008 to 45 so far this year. If that number stands, it would the city's lowest homicide rate since 1961.

Overall, Newsom and Gascon say violent crime, a category that includes rapes and aggravated assaults, is down 10 percent from 2008, as hot spots such as the city's Bayview-Hunter's Point neighborhood and Mission district are seeing double-digit declines.

Newsom credited more targeted policing efforts for the decline in crime.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2009 ... homicides/

Well....I think ole Newsom is fudging the numbers. Violent crime is not down here. Maybe less people just happened to not die from the violence. There were three people shot at Sinbads Restaurant just two nights ago. Gang related. Two of the victims were children. And Mission is not safer than last year, that is for sure. And Muni (the bus system) has been very violent. Fights are breaking out all the time. It was not very long ago that a teen was stabbed on Muni. So I really dont know where Newsom is pulling his "declining" numbers from. They are talking about how to put more cops in "hot spots" to ward off the increase in violence on Muni.