http://thechiefleader.com/news/news_of_the_week/policing-experts-claim-nypd-may-be-gaming-decline-in-homicides/article_ca3019e2-9ec3-11e1-bda7-001a4bcf6878.html
Reminder, me Suzannah and only me has said Dept of Building Stats not accurate because so many illegal immigrants and workers working illegally period on construction sites getting injured are not coming forward. I did wonder about dead bodies and DOB fudging stats so I wasn’t surprised to given the heads up on this article.....
Sorry folks but The Chief does not give you the entire read for free....here is an excerpt...
By MARK TOOR — Friday, May 25th, 2012; 4:00 p.m. ‘The Chief / Civil Service Leader’
The conventional wisdom is that it’s hard to fiddle with homicide statistics because you can’t hide the bodies, but a pair of policing experts say it appears the NYPD has figured out ways to do just that.
“We’ve been told by people on the force that they’re doing everything they can to game the system, including homicides,” said Eli Silverman, who with retired Police Capt. John Eterno wrote a book, “The Crime Numbers Game: Management by Manipulation,” making the case that the department’s Compstat crime-analysis system has made middle-managers downgrade crime reports and take other questionable actions to show never-ending decreases.
City Claims Historic Low
The Police Department and the Bloomberg administration claim homicides are occurring this year at the lowest rate since police began recording statistics in 1963. The department announced that it recorded 129 homicides through May 11, down 21 percent from a similar period in 2011. At the same time, however, shootings were up 6 percent from last year
Mayor Bloomberg brags that the decline in homicides since he took office has saved 5,600 lives compared to the totals during the prior decade. He uses this figure to defend the department’s controversial stop-and-frisk program, which a rising number of critics say promotes hundreds of thousands of unjustified stops, primarily of young black and Hispanic men.
The Bloomberg administration argues that the program discourages people from carrying guns they could use in the heat of the moment to settle an argument. Mr. Bloomberg has refused to meet with City Council Members and community leaders who are critical of it.
Some critics have questioned his use of the “5,600 lives saved,” which is based on a comparison between his first 10 years in office and the 10 years preceding it, which began with the crack epidemic still raging through poorer areas of the city and driving the annual homicide totals above 2,000.