As of yesterday, there had been 282 killings, compared with 343 during the same period in 1997 - a drop of nearly 18 percent. Police Inspector Jerrold Kane, commander of the homicide division and a statistics buff who has closely watched the murder rate during 43 years as a detective and police commander, predicts that the city will end the year with at least 15 percent fewer killings than last year. That would be the biggest one-year percentage drop since 1984. If the current homicide pace continues unchanged, there will be 339 slayings by year's end - 70 fewer than last year and the lowest yearly total since 1987, when there were 338. Though top Police Department officials have acknowledged that underreporting of crime is widespread in the department, the homicide count is considered reliable.
Opinions vary as to what is causing the reduction.
Some experts credit police crackdowns on guns, drugs, and nuisance crimes. Another theory popular among criminologists is that the crack cocaine trade is now controlled by fewer and better organized sellers than in the late 1980s, when a larger number of unsophisticated dealers fought it out over turf, with bloody results. It may be economic. Homicides this year have played out in seemingly random fits and starts. During the first four months of the year, murders dropped 26 percent compared with the same period a year before.