Police see
‘significant’ drop
in Oahu crimeOverall crime declines
by 8 percent this year,
Chief Donohue says
Honolulu police Chief Lee Donohue announced yesterday that there has been a "significant" decrease in overall crime on Oahu so far this year when compared with the same period last year.
Donohue said that from January through August, overall crime has decreased a total of about 8 percent, noting it was "significant" because crime on Oahu in 2002 went up 18 percent from the year before.
"We had a real bad (last) year," Donohue said. "This year, (there) was a drop of 11 percent in larcenies ... a 9 percent (drop) in burglaries and a total overall reduction in crime by 8 percent.
"So it's quite significant."
HPD officials had crime statistics only through July available for the media. According to those numbers, violent crime on Oahu went up 8.8 percent for the first seven months of the year, while total crime was down 5.3 percent.
Donohue's comments came after two separate reports released this week showed the state had an increase in crime last year. According to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program, Hawaii led the nation in larceny-theft cases for the third consecutive year in 2002.
The same report also showed that Hawaii's overall property crime rate remained among the top three states, dropping from second highest in 2001 to third highest in the nation in 2002 with 5,782 reported cases per every 100,000 residents.
Also yesterday, the Department of the Attorney General released its annual Uniform Crime Report, which showed that the state's crime rate per 100,000 residents increased 12.2 percent from 2001 to 2002.
But the report noted that serious juvenile crime in Hawaii reached its fifth consecutive record low in 2002, with 2,499 arrests reported statewide. According to attorney general officials, Juvenile Index Crime arrests ranged from 4,000 to 7,000 annually during the 1975-1997 period. The number of arrests has plummeted in each subsequent year since 1997.
"While there have been crime rate increases during the last three years, the increases are based upon Hawaii's unprecedented low crime rates during the late 1990s," said state Attorney General Mark Bennett. "And while the 2002 crime rate is somewhat higher than historical averages, it is also below the level reported 10 years ago."
According to the attorney general's report, the state's violent crime rate per 100,000 residents increased 2.7 percent while the property crime rate increased 12.7 percent.
Other statistics from the report include the state's murder and rape rates per 100,000 residents, which decreased 26.9 percent and 10.5 percent, respectively. The robbery rate increased 4.2 percent, and the aggravated-assault rate rose 6.1 percent.
In the property crime category, motor vehicle theft rates per 100,000 residents rose statewide by 44.5 percent, burglaries by 12.1 percent and larceny thefts by 8 percent in 2002. The motor vehicle theft rate increase in particular is the highest on record, according to attorney general officials.
