Killings in D.C. at 20-Year Low Point

Police Give Credit To Better Tactics

The District is on pace to finish the year with fewer than 200 homicides, a significant drop from last year and a mark not reached for nearly two decades.

Through the first six months of the year, the District recorded 91 killings, down about 25 percent from the same period in 2003, when the city had 122. At the current rate, the city will end the year with about 180 homicides.

The last time the city recorded fewer than 200 killings was in 1986, when it tallied 196. That was before the spread of crack cocaine and firearms sparked a surge in homicides that gave Washington the notorious distinction of being the nation's "murder capital." In 1991, the city had 482 killings.

"It's good to be sitting in this position and looking at these numbers," D.C. Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey said last week. "It's all going in the right direction."

The number of homicides from October through last month is down 25 percent, or 152 vs. 203 during the same period a year ago. This shows that the drop is not just a blip, Ramsey said.

"This is something that is holding up a little longer than since January," said Ramsey, who joined the department as chief in 1998.

Overall crime during the first six months of the year was down 12 percent, and violent crime had declined 17 percent compared with the same period in 2003, according to preliminary police statistics.

Police officials said they believe that some of the crime drop can be attributed to strategies crafted at daily meetings of commanders. The sessions, which take place in a room filled with high-tech computers and screens that display crime maps, allow commanders to brainstorm and react quickly to flare-ups of violence, Ramsey said.

The chief said the city has benefited from his decision to call a crime emergency in late August after numerous incidents of gang-related violence and several high-profile homicides. The emergency measure canceled rules that required commanders to give officers 14 days' notice before changing their schedules. Under the rules, commanders were given more flexibility to deal with outbreaks of crime. Ramsey ended the crime emergency in January.

The chief also credited partnerships with other city agencies that focus on hot spots of crime and other problems in troubled neighborhoods.

While saying that D.C. police deserve some credit, criminologists said that societal factors were probably playing a larger role -- a view echoed by some D.C. Council members. These include a strong economy, robust housing market and the ebbing of turf battles among gangs over crack cocaine, they said.

Council member Adrian M. Fenty (D-Ward 4), often a sharp critic of the department, said he has noticed officers and commanders responding more aggressively to crime in recent months.

Still, Fenty expressed concern about the number of juveniles slain this year on city streets. Thirteen youths have been killed this year, one more than recorded during all of last year. One, 8-year-old Chelsea Cromartie, was slain by a stray bullet that pierced a window of her aunt's living room in May. Fenty said that police need to do more to prevent such violence.

"That is a signal that we are heading in the wrong direction," Fenty said of the juvenile killings. "I'm glad homicides are going down. In most other respects, we have a long way to go."