NYPD Crime Statistics, continued
About five years ago, I began to write occasional articles that questioned the validity of New York City’s crime statistics reported through CompStat, a vaunted crime-fighting tool that has been emulated across the country. I noted the discrepancy between publicly reported crimes on the FBI’s index of seven major crimes and the comparable lesser crimes that received little attention – for example, serious assaults vs. misdemeanor assaults, or grand larceny vs. petit larceny. All the numbers dropped sharply the first two years after CompStat was introduced, but after that golden era, the “index” crimes kept dropping sharply while the non-index offenses leveled off. For example, from CompStat’s first full year in 1995 to 2002, “index” or aggravated assaults dropped 33 percent, while non-index, or lesser, assaults stayed about level, dropping 3 percent. This was consistent with what the city’s police union had charged in 2004: that crimes were being routinely downgraded. Crime was down, for sure, but not as much as the numbers showed. If the union was right, fraud was endemic. The numbers alone suggested the need for an independent investigation.
After 2002, the NYPD refused to release the numbers for non-index crimes. I and others filed numerous Freedom of Information Law requests, but the department flouted the law. (My last appeal wasn’t even answered.) But the New York Times recently noted that the numbers were being withheld and filed suit to get this data. Now, under cover of a blizzard, the NYPD has released the numbers.
The new numbers for non-index crimes are in a different format from the past, making a precise comparison impossible. But there is still enough information to spot broad trends.
The numbers show that the drop in major, publicly reported crimes has continued to outpace the drop in lesser offenses by a significant margin (although not as sharply as in the past). Aggravated assaults dropped 12 percent from 2003 to 2009, while lesser ones remained about level, falling 2 percent. Meanwhile, city hospital records have shown an increasing number of people hospitalized for assaults.
Downgrading crimes is just part of the problem. Recent news coverage has shown how crime victims are systematically discouraged from reporting crimes – say, if a commanding officer insists that complaints will only be taken if the victim goes to the precinct station house. This was documented by a police officer in Brooklyn who secretly recorded the roll calls in his precinct. Newspaper reports detailed the scheme.
We live in a society that places too much faith in data – school reading scores, earnings reports, and many other performance indicators. It’s good to have the data, but when too much rides on the numbers, watch out.
Often, the supposed watchdogs are those most likely to rely on questionable data. The editorial board of the New York Daily News is a prime example. It’s often astute, but time and again, it blindly attacks those experts who have questioned the credibility of the police crime reports. Now, it claims that the trends in the new numbers just released are “more or less parallel” – that the 12 percent drop in serious assaults is pretty much the same as the 2 percent drop in lesser assaults.
I don’t think News owner Mort Zuckerman would view such a difference in his circulation figures the same way.
For a vigorous defense of Compstat and a description of the measures that the NYPD takes to insure accurate crime statistics see Heather Mac Donald’s article, Compstat and Its Enemies:
http://www.city-journal.org/2010/eon0217hm.html
I recently heard her speak about some of the questionable studies mentioned here. I paraphrase her response: Much as I love policemen, some of them can be lazy. They don’t like the pressure and accountability that CompStat imposes, especially compared to the good old days when crime was rampant. It’s no surprise that their unions sponsor studies that try to discredit the validity of management approaches, including CompStat.
I began pursuing this because various police officers I know kept telling me about what was happening with crime stats. They were outraged at what they saw going on because it was so dishonest. So I began looking at the numbers and asking for more. The numbers showed some serious discrepancies. I asked under the Freedom of Information Law to see the audit reports Heather MacDonald discusses, but the NYPD would not release them (and even claimed, falsely I assume, not to have any such records). The cops who alerted me to the problems with crime stats didn’t think the auditors were much of a threat. For example, one told me about a big office building in his precinct where a lot of laptops were being stolen – but listed as lost property, not thefts. (And when I checked, I found that citywide lost-property reports had skyrocketed.)
MacDonald discusses a study, financed by a Police Department-connected foundation, by NYU’s Dennis Smith that the NYPD uses to support its numbers. But that study doesn’t touch the numbers for assault, which are among the most suspect data. Nor does it deal with the rise in lost-property reports when it discusses grand larcenies. Smith left out a lot. So does Heather MacDonald, however eloquent she is.
All that’s needed is an independent investigation. When the city’s mayoral Commission to Combat Police Corruption tried to do that, the NYPD refused to release any information to it. The mayor backed the police commissioner, and the chairman of the investigative commission quit.
“This was documented by a police officer in Brooklyn who secretly recorded the roll calls in his precinct.”
You can listen here, in a “This American Life” segment:
http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/414/right-to-remain-silent
“We live in a society that places too much faith in data – school reading scores, earnings reports, and many other performance indicators. It’s good to have the data, but when too much rides on the numbers, watch out.” – Amen
This is phenomenon is particularly problematic when there are attempts to apply it to the “products” delivered by the public sector. The “market advocates” vs “market skeptics” debate will continue to intensify with cash strapped taxpayers demanding lower taxes and politicians looking to improve the “performance” of the bureaucracy. The country also needs to have a discussion on the value of “user fee” funded bureaucracy and how this effects the behavior of public organizations attempting to carry out their missions.
I agree in spades with Tobias – and in matters of public health and safety, it’s critical that real figures lie behind decsion making.
So much of “public service” has become politicized instead of professionalized that we need greater scrutiny from the media, like Paul, and academe to make best use of what in hard times undoubtedly will be dwindling resources.