L.B.
homicide rates increase
By Gina Ponce
On-line Forty-Niner
 Long
Beach has seen a recent increase in homicide
rates during the last year. To date, reported
homicides for 2002 have reached 57, while
in 2001 there were only 52.
According
to Sgt. Kevin Coy of the Long Beach Police
Department a bit of everything contributes
to crime rate statistics.
“If
the economy is down in certain areas that
can significantly affect crime,” he said.
“In the inner cities there aren’t as many
jobs and there’s no money flowing in.
People can turn to criminal activities to
support themselves and their family.
Economy is definitely the biggest factor.”
During
the summer, crime usually increases for
two major reasons, Coy said. First, school
is out so people are not constantly busy.
Second, the heat tends to make people upset
easily. In contrast, rates decrease
in winter because people do not want to
be outside in the cold weather.
Gang
violence has also increased, Coy said.
“We’re
not totally sure why these are up,” he said.
“Gang violence can spark over anything.
It’s a spiraling thing and once it starts
it’s hard to stop it.”
Sgt.
Paul LeBaron of the Long Beach Police Department
also added juvenile delinquency as a cause
for crime due to bad family situations.
He said a lot of the gang crime is related
with juveniles.
More
attention has been given to gang-related
offenses in an attempt to combat the rise
in crime, LeBaron said.
“We
have officers specially assigned to work
with gangs,” he said. “We have recently
served search warrants on gangs and recovered
guns that have been linked to murders that
have occurred in Long Beach this year.”
As
part of the Community Relations Division,
Coy said that it would be helpful if the
community found ways to keep people 12 to
21 years old busy so they are not always
outside. He said Long Beach organizations
do a good job of that already.
The
Boys & Girls Clubs of Long Beach has
developed programs to combat crime. The
Gang Prevention Intervention Through Targeted
Outreach program is designed to help youths
6 to 18 years old.
Delinquent
youths, or at-risk youths, are identified
and recruited into club programs and activities
through referrals from schools, courts,
law enforcement and community youth service
agencies.
The
Street SMART program, which stands for Skills
Mastery and Resistance Training, focuses
on helping youths 11 to 13 years old in
resisting gangs and violence, resolving
conflicts and being positive peer helpers
in their communities.
Judy
Hails, a criminal justice professor at Cal
State Long Beach, said that murder occurs
the least often of the basic crimes. Burglary
is number one.
“You
could stop all murders and have relatively
little effect on the rate because murders
are such a small portion of the rate,” Hails
said.
University
Police Capt. Stan Skipworth said that crimes
on campus have gone down compared to the
rest of Long Beach. On the other hand, arrests
have gone up.
“This
shows me that there is a growing proficiency
among the police officers here in identifying
developing trends and early actions of crime,”
Skipworth said.
According
to Skipworth, the University Police is able
to stay well informed with the information
available from the Long Beach Police Department.
He said networking has helped to share more
information between departments on a regular
basis.
Skipworth
said the community and the LBPD are working
to be more informed with the campus and
are impressed with the job the University
Police has done, and in turn, are becoming
more willing to share information.
University
Police Communications Greg Pascal said there
are more property crimes than assaults and
batteries on campus. Specific numbers
were not available.
The
annual crime statistics that the University
Police puts out every year has not been
updated since 2000. Skipworth said
the police are working on being timelier
with this information. According to
Sgt. Bonnie Meyers, the reports for 2002
should be coming out in the second or third
week of October.
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