Major crime rate down 13 percent

Major crime in the city of Boston fell by 13 percent over the first five months of the year, compared with the same period last year, a drop that stirred praise from city officials but got a cool response from youth workers and residents in crime-ridden areas.

''I think the number speaks for itself," Police Commissioner Kathleen M. O'Toole said in an interview yesterday. ''The city has made a dramatic improvement in recent years, but it will continue to be a work in progress."

''Working with the community, we're going to keep a close eye on trends, particularly violent crime involving young people -- guns, gangs, and drugs, that's our number one concern," O'Toole said.

The drop, in a report released yesterday, comes in the midst of a year when police have sought to quell violence among Cape Verdean youth and calm residents in city housing developments, rocked by several murders. The report examines crimes committed between January and May of 2005.

The number of homicides remained unchanged, at 21, police said.

''If crime is down, that's a good thing," said Emmett Folgert, director of the Dorchester Youth Collaborative in Fields Corner. ''The problem is, I'm in a high crime area, so crime is always high. I haven't noticed much change."

O'Toole attributed the drop in part to increased patrols, known as Operation Rolling Thunder, which target different neighborhoods on different nights. The patrols, many of which involve vans, cruisers, mounted police, and bikes, are designed to make police more visible when the actual number of officers is dwindling due to budget cuts, she said.

O'Toole also credited a new tactical information center, which is designed to analyze crime data to allow officers to more quickly respond to trouble spots. The program grew out of the police buildup to the Democratic National Convention last July, she said.

Overall, property crime fell 17 percent, while violent crime rose by 1 percent.

The major crime tally stood at 12,094 through May, down from 13,947 last year and a huge drop from the city's crime-plagued years in the 1980s when the numbers hovered around 28,000. Major crimes include homicides, rapes, larceny, burglary, robbery, and aggravated assault.

Rapes and attempted rapes fell by 4 percent compared with the period last year, from 115 to 110, while aggravated assaults dropped by 2 percent. The biggest change came in two areas: car theft and attempted car theft fell by 28 percent, and larceny and attempted larceny fell 19 percent. Larceny includes most thefts that don't involve fear-inducing force, such as car-radio thefts.

''We worked harder with community groups," Mayor Thomas M. Menino said. He credited the drop in part to an initiative to send youth workers to 800 households with children who were identified by the youth workers as being at-risk for crime. Clergy have also helped the program, he said.

The bad news was that burglaries, mostly thefts from residences, and attempted burglaries rose by 7 percent, while robberies and attempted robberies, which often involve the use of force, jumped 8 percent, the report showed.

Part of the rise, O'Toole's aides said, might be due to an increase in thefts of cellphones and handheld computers, which account for 15 percent to 20 percent of all robberies in Boston.

''I think there have been a number of great initiatives that have helped, no doubt about it, but I don't want to make this sound like a hip-hip hooray," said Chris Sumner, executive director of the Boston TenPoint Coalition, which seeks to reduce crime. Sumner said community groups helped keep young people off the street this summer and helped to inform them about patrols such as Operation Rolling Thunder, before they descended on neighborhoods.

''Overall, we don't have a utopia here, and that's quite obvious," said Councilor Stephen J. Murphy, who chairs the city's Public Safety Committee. Murphy said the city is still struggling with too few officers, but has a plan to add 105 by next summer. Still, Murphy said he was pleased with the drop.

Councilor at large Maura A. Hennigan, who is challenging Menino for mayor, focused on homicides in the city. Yesterday, she attended a community meeting on Amory Street in Jamaica Plain, where 65-year-old Charles Wilson was recently found shot to death in his bed. Terry Gray, 37, of Roxbury, has been charged with the murder. ''These numbers don't mean a lot," Hennigan said. ''Sadly, you turn on your television, you turn on your radio, you open up your newspaper, and someone else is a victim of homicide. . . . Our police, our department is not at the level that will provide our citizens the protection that we need."