FORT WAYNE, Ind. (Fort Wayne's NBC) - Mayor Tom Henry and Fort Wayne Police Chief Steve Reed say 2021 is shaping up to be safer, in terms of what the city's crime rate looks like.
It's just for the first seven months of 2021, but right now the city is on pace to see crime, especially violent crime, fall off significantly.
Henry and Reed summoned reporters Monday and referenced charts that show violent crimes are down 46 percent versus what happened the first seven months of 2020.
Homicides they say are down 13 percent, while property crimes, including burglary, theft and auto theft, are down by a lesser amount, about six percent.
We know that 2020 was a chaotic time across the nation, and Fort Wayne was no exception.
The pandemic drove up stress, anxiety and agitation for many people and the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis triggered explosive Black Lives Matter demonstrations throughout the U.S., in some cases sparking calls for authorities to de-fund the police.
There were Black Lives Matter protests in Fort Wayne as well.
Homicides were up in 2020 in cities both large and small.
Mayor Henry and representatives of the Fort Wayne Police Department credit citizens with providing valuable tips and other assistance to help officers crack down on crime threats in the city.
Has public trust in police, which suffered to some degree last year, rebounded in Fort Wayne in a substantial way?
"In my conversations with other mayors, that part of the equation, they are still struggling with, where I think in Fort Wayne we're seeing a significant increase... and again it's not just trust, it's overall communication, it's awareness, it's sensitivity training," Mayor Henry said.
"Right afterwards, you kind of wondered, OK, what's it going to be? Is there going to be retribution (against police), is there going to be this conflict? I think that the citizens were able to say, hey, you know what? It was over and done with and we moved on and we did our job, and consequently I think the trust came back," said Officer Mark Bieker, who works in the city police department's operations division.
FWPD says non-fatal shootings are up 22 percent so far in 2021 compared to the same time frame last year.
Chief Reed says in an effort to combat that problem, arrests for possession of a handgun without a license are up more than 50 percent in the city from January through July.
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August 10, 2021 at 06:26AM
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Crime stats show big drop-off in Fort Wayne's violent crime rate in 2021 - Fort Wayne's NBC
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