Crime Down in Fort Greene, Despite Unease
There’s an overall feeling that things are not going right in Fort Greene, Paul Palazzo of the Fort Greene Association told The Brooklyn Eagle. Several crimes in the area have made the news, adding to the foreboding feeling in the neighborhood: the brutal attack on Pratt student Eddy Sanchez and disposed human remains found in…
There’s an overall feeling that things are not going right in Fort Greene, Paul Palazzo of the Fort Greene Association told The Brooklyn Eagle. Several crimes in the area have made the news, adding to the foreboding feeling in the neighborhood: the brutal attack on Pratt student Eddy Sanchez and disposed human remains found in the trash along Walworth Street. You get the impression that the sky is falling in Fort Greene, says Captain Anthony Tasso, commanding officer of the 88th Precinct, but at Wednesday night’s meeting of Community Board 2, he stated that overall crime is down 12 percent—the only crime to increase, he added, is residential burglaries, which went up 13 percent compared to last year; otherwise, robberies, car break-ins, rape, and shootings are all down. He also mentioned a recent increase in robberies around Fort Greene Park at night, and has increased patrols accordingly. If you look at the statistics (PDF) for the year to date, for example, all categories of crime have decreased compared to the same period of 2008. Meanwhile, reportes Brooklyn Heights Blog, crime is also down across the board in the 84th Precinct (Brooklyn Heights, Dumbo, Boerum Hill) as well.
Crime in Fort Greene Is Down, Captain Says [Brooklyn Eagle]
Despite Brutal Assault, Crime Down in 88th [Brownstoner]
Precinct Crime Statistics [NYPD]
Photo by Dominic Ridolfo
friend of mine was assaulted a few weeks ago on Lafayette and Carlton… Broken jaw, broken teeth, phone stolen, huge dentist bill…it was 10 am…
“Captain Anthony Tasso … needs to be held accountable to his superiors downtown.”
With CompStat, he will be–if his numbers are bad. But the fact of the matter is, most crime figures in the 88th Precinct are down. Horrible, high-profile crimes skew people’s perception. And, granted, “Numbers of Skeevvy Corners that Make People Nervous” is not a category where statistics are maintained.
smeyer418:
Making assumptions about actions taken when shots are heard gives your lecture on civic duty less validity.
Again, I suggest Tasso himself take a stroll in the park along Myrtle on a Friday or Saturday night to see what is going on and to understand the situation better. He should make sure he is armed though, because he probably will look like a nice target in plainclothes.
The Captain of the 88th reported at the meeting of CB #2 on Wednesday night that the reason they only do radio cars is that he has insufficient resources to do foot patrols. The cars do double duty of driving through the park and are available for calls and other duties throughout the precinct. he reportedly has 135 cops for 3 shifts 7 days a week(with vacations and other time off this means less than 30 cops are available for the entire precinct per shift. He reportedly does have plain clothes patrols but they normally end by 1 or 2 when crime begins to wane. if you hear gun shots you need to report it as without a report it doesn’t exist. According to Tasso he reads every report made and every report made to 311. The lighting at the park was raised at the meeting. Again unless someone complains no one is going to take care of it(sometimes councilmembers will allocate money for lightening based on complaints…
Every precinct has a community council that meets once a month where the Captain and most of the senior staff shows. If you have issues and want them responded to show up and complain. Posting it here is the cowards way.
There is constant gunfire around Ft. Greene Park along Myrtle like it is a war zone. For instance, tonight (9/11/09) many.many gunshots at the corner of Myrtle and St. Edwards. Myrtle blocked off for several hours. Did Tasso hear about that? The gunshots are almost every weekend. Captain Anthony Tasso seems to be talking about a different neighborhood—or at least a different part of the neighborhood. Why doesn’t he take a walk plainclothes some Friday or Saturday night and try to make it across the park without hearing pop, pop, pop. This is unacceptable and he needs to be held accountable to his superiors downtown. I’m tired of gunshots on the same corner almost every weekend. It doesn’t take a good detective, commander or strategist to figure out that there is something not right.
As always, the cop haters fail to respond to the point about homicides. Any takers? I didn’t think so. I wouldn’t be surprised if you all started talking about a warehouse in Canarsie where the NYPD hides bodies.
Morons…
And one more thing — the lighting in and around FG park, ESPECIALLY on the Myrtle side is goddamn horrible — even Washington is poor due to the tree coverage. One would think this is an easy area of improvement that could make things a BIT safer.
Cooked stats for sure. Why no foot patrol officers in FG and CH? Let’s see some deterrence not undercovers rolling around in obvious unmarked cars. I mean you see police presence occasionally — in response to the “crime of the day,” but no real pro-active measures, always reactive. All the gentrification talk “what did you expect living near the projects” should fall on deaf ears. Are we trying to say that the projects should have operated as a “hamsterdam” but for the arrival of whitey? Isn’t the 88th supposed to do their job regardless of whether there is gentrification or not? It is sad/pathetic that gentrification may be the only thing to draw attention to the issue, but the fact of the matter is that gentrification has occurred and sloppy policing is/should no longer be tolerated. “You get what you deserve” just doesn’t cut it. Their are pj’s in Cobble Hill and adjacent to nearly every nabe in BK. For f’s sake we are living at the base of the gateway(s) to Manhattan, of course people are going to migrate to this area and the policing needs to be commensurate with such migration. Everyone on this site (practically) that lives in the FG/CH area can name at least 2 problem intersections, so why does the 88th have such problems cleaning things up?
I found this piece:
http://www.brooklynpaper.com/stories/31/41/31_41_mm_c-hill_crime.html?comm=1