Violent crime on the rise in Goldsboro
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on March 6, 2016 1:45 AM
The Goldsboro Police Department recently released its Uniform Crime Report for 2015, which showed that, by all accounts, Goldsboro was more violent in 2015 than it has been since 2011.
Murders, rapes, aggravated assaults and simple assaults all increased from 2014 to 2015. Murders went up by 50 percent, rapes spiked by 100 percent, and more assaults -- both simple and aggravated -- occurred in 2015 than had occurred in the past five years.
In nearly all categories tracked by the department's Uniform Crime Report, the total number of crimes in the city was higher in 2015 than it has been in nearly five years.
Interim Police Chief Michael West said he isn't sure he has a good answer yet as to why.
"I don't know if it's a case to where you've got more people actually reporting more crimes than they did back in 2012, 2013, 2014," West said. "The way it's broken down on the report here is, unfortunately, it gives you the end of the year numbers, and I'm just curious if I can sift it to where I can look month by month to see where the bumps occurred."
In 2015, there were 3,169 crimes reported across nine categories -- homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, simple assault, burglary, larceny, vehicle theft and arson. This is the highest number of crimes reported since 2011, when there were 3,334.
But the numbers for each category can be misleading, with percentages giving the perception of a larger increase than the actual number of cases.
Such was the case with the number of rapes reported in 2015. The number did double from 2014 to 2015, but in reality there was one rape in 2014 and two in 2015.
Across the board, crime was up in Goldsboro in 2015, according to the numbers. But three of the nine categories tracked by the annual report did show a decline -- among them, arson saw a significant drop by 67 percent. The other two categories that dropped -- larceny and vehicle theft -- fell by two and nine percent, respectively.
"When you look at the big picture of it, you can say arsons went down 67 percent, which is great, but actually in 2014 it spiked, and in 2015 it went down to pretty much what was normal for the five years that we looked at," West said. "At this point I really can't explain some of the stuff because I really need to start looking at it different. Looking at it right here, I can tell you all about what I see, but I've got to get deeper into it and get into it a whole lot deeper and maybe break it down by month. It could be the warm weather brings out more crime, but there's just a lot of different ways we've got to start looking at it."
Categories tracking violent crime -- homicide, rape, aggravated assault and simple assault -- all increased from 2014 to 2015.
Aggravated assault involves a weapon, while simple assault does not. Both categories of assault are the highest they have been during the last five years.
One possible explanation for this trend, West said, is an uptick in shootings that weren't always fatal at the end of the summer in 2015 -- there were more than 100 shots fired calls during August 2015. Of those calls, 17 people were shot, and three people were killed in August 2015.
"It's more violent," West said. "I mean, there's more violent people out there than there has been in the past."
West said the department is looking to implement several different tactics to reduce crime in 2016, though he is hesitant to put a percentage on exactly how much the department is seeking to reduce crime.
Any reduction is crime is a good thing, he said, and putting a number on the goal but not reaching that number could make the department look like it failed, though any crime reduction is considered a success.
"I'm not a big stickler on saying we'll reduce crime by 5 percent, because I want to reduce crime as much as we can," West said. "You put that threshold out there that we want to do it by 5 percent, and then next year if we only come in as reducing it by 3 percent, then it's perceived that we didn't do as well we said we were going to do."
Joint operations between law enforcement agencies, emphasizing a connection between the community and police and utilizing more technology are all ways West said the department can make a dent in the crime rate in Goldsboro.
"I just don't really like saying, 'Yep, we went up 8.4 percent, yep, there were more people reporting crimes, so it just makes it look like things are getting worse for us.' I'm not really satisfied with that explanation," West said. "I'd really like to look to see to pinpoint it."