WASHINGTON » Property crimes took a nose dive in Honolulu in 2008 while violent crime in Honolulu rose slightly.

Honolulu showed a 15.2 percent decrease in property crimes to 46,004 cases in 2008 from 54,228 in 2007, led by a 23.6 percent drop in auto thefts, according to the FBI.

But nationally, property crimes declined overall, by 0.8 percent, driven mostly by a 12.7 percent drop in car thefts. The other major categories of property crime — burglaries and larceny-thefts — both rose.

In Honolulu, burglaries increased 3.1 percent to 9,379 cases in 2008 from 9,097 in 2007 while larceny thefts dropped 18 percent to 31,492 in 2008 compared with 38,416 in 2007, the FBI said.

Violent crime increased 0.3 percent to 3,512 in 2008, compared with 3,501 in 2007, according to the FBI.

Nationally, murder and manslaughter dropped almost 4 percent last year, as reported crime overall fell, according to new data released yesterday by the FBI.

The 3.9 percent decline in killings reported to police was part of a nationwide drop in violent crime of 1.9 percent from 2007 to 2008. Rapes declined 1.6 percent, to the lowest national number in 20 years — about 89,000.

But in Honolulu, murders and manslaughter cases rose 13.6 percent to 25 in 2008 from 22 in 2007, the FBI said. Rape increased 12 percent to 365 in 2008 from 326 in 2007.

The statistics are based on crimes reported to police, who then forward the information to the FBI. There were 14,180 murder victims in the United States last year.

“;What has been impressive has been how flat all the violent crime rates have been since 2000. To a large degree that's still the case, but the striking change this year has been murder,”; said Alfred Blumstein, a professor of criminal justice at Carnegie-Mellon University.

The figures show that crime has come way down since its peak in the early 1990s.

“;These are rates we haven't seen since the 1960s, even though the change from year to year has been rather small,”; Blumstein said.

ON THE NET:
» FBI Crime Report: www.fbi.gov/page2/sept09/crimestats_091409.html