Crime & Safety
With New Crime Stats Coming Soon from the Police Department, Here's How the First Quarter Looked for Safety in Albany
Crime statistics from January through April are posted on the city's website -- and here. Police Chief Mike McQuiston said he's working on preparing the next round of numbers.
Motor vehicle thefts in Albany climbed for most of the first quarter of 2010, as did burglaries and larcenies, according to statistics released by the Police Department.
But there were notable exceptions. There were, for example, six robberies in that time period, four in January and two in April. In 2009 there were 37 robberies throughout the year.
Neither homicides nor rapes have been reported this year. In 2009, one rape was reported. There were no homicides, according to the data. (PDFs for January through April 2010 are attached to this story.)
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There were at least nine felony arrests and 52 misdemeanor arrests from January through April, according to the reports.
As of April, there had been 31 auto thefts in Albany, seven in January, five in February, eight in March and 11 in April. Last year, there were 106, which means the city is in slightly better shape than the pace set in 2009.
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There were five burglaries in January, seven in February, nine in March and 12 in April, for a total of 33. It's not clear from the monthly reports whether these are home burglaries, auto burglaries or commercial thefts. In 2009, there were 110 burglaries. Again, this year is looking somewhat brighter than last as far as average pace.
Larcenies, or petty thefts, are by far the most common crime, with 154 already this year, as of April. Last year there were 408. Continuing at this pace would push us ahead of the 2009 number.
Parking citations hovered in the 500 range for all four months. April was the lowest, with 515 citations.
Patrol officers, on the other hand, wrote 200 to 300 tickets per month. In April, there were 243 tickets written to vehicle drivers, two written to cyclists, 36 written to drivers in parked cars (other than parking citations), eight to pedestrians and two that were unclassified, for a total of 291 patrol officer citations.
There were 2,223 reports and incidents in April, nearly 1,300 of which were officer initiated. There were 932 calls for service. That was up from January, though relatively steady during the four months.
There were 190 911 calls in January; statistics for the other months were not available.
