Listen to the debates and diatribes coming at us almost daily in the D.C. mayor’s race, and you will hear plenty about cronyism and communication, baseball tickets and bike lanes, unemployment and housing.
What about crime? Most pols are mum.
Are we now so safe in our streets and homes that we don’t need our politicians to delve into the crime issue, tell us what they have done and what they might do in office?
Mayor Adrian Fenty says crime numbers are down, and he touts falling homicide rates as testament to his crime-fighting programs. Are his numbers accurate? Does he deserve credit?
Challenger Vincent Gray has been silent on crime and violence. He rarely talks about public safety on the campaign trail or in forums. His Web site purports to cover crime, but his plan is pure palaver. No specifics. Zero.
Nothing from Gray — or Fenty — on the alarming rise in sexual assaults. According to the police department’s own statistics, sexual assaults are up by nearly 50 percent across town; in some parts of the District they are up 325 percent.
Police reports on the sexual assaults are graphic, disgusting and disturbing. One victim reported that a man confronted her in a stairwell, said “Get undressed and bend over,” assaulted her then took her purse. Another was arguing with a man over a cell phone when he started slapping her and said: “If you don’t [perform oral sex] I will break your jaw.” The most disturbing report described a father asking his son to perform a sex act.
Are we suffering an epidemic of rapes and sexual assaults? We won’t hear much about it on the campaign trail.
Without a doubt murders are down to numbers the capital city hasn’t seen since the 1960s. Last year this time there had been 87 homicides; to date police report 72, for a drop of 17 percent. We might even close the year with fewer than 100 murders.
Fenty takes credit for the drop. He should, if only because he would be taking heat if homicides were rising.
“I don’t challenge the fact that homicides are down,” says Kristopher Baumann, head of the police union and staunch critic of Fenty and his police chief, Cathy Lanier. But he does point out that D.C. is following a national trend.
Fenty is on less solid ground when it comes to robberies, assaults and gun violence. Many parts of the capital remain violent. The police department has a history of defining down crime and doctoring crime reports to make the city look safer. For example, Fenty’s garage was broken into this spring, but it never made the department’s crime reports.
“By their own numbers,” says Baumann, “crime over the last three years is at best flat if not slightly up, which is opposite the national trends.”
The trend is bad on robberies and guns — horrible on sexual assaults — which makes it essential that the candidates clarify their plans to make the city more safe.
Harry Jaffe’s column appears on Tuesday and Friday. He can be contacted at [email protected].
