Crime falls in Atlanta, but not fear of crime
Crime has dropped in Atlanta, surpassing national trends, but local residents might have a hard time believing the city is any safer after a recent spell of violence.
For the first half of the year, violent and property crime were down 11 and 15 percent, respectively, according to the latest FBI crime statistics. National decreases for those categories were 6 and 3 percent.
After a man was shot to death in Virginia-Highland, amid a series of other violent crimes, Atlanta Police Chief George Turner acknowledged residents likely feel less safe.
"Crime is officially down but anytime somebody is a victim I take it personally," Turner said. "We have a long ways to go. Like I tell my kids, ‘We're not celebrating being on third base.'"
While homicides were down in the first half of the year, the city now has nine more killings than the 80 registered in 2009. However, Atlanta has a chance to have fewer than 100 murders in a year for just the third time since 1964, APD spokesman Carlos Campos said.
"We are up in murders but it is kind of deceptive because 80 was a very low bench mark for last year," Campos said. “Rapes are way down. Robberies are way down. Burglaries are way down.”
Peggy Denby, Midtown-Ponce Security Alliance president, said the brazenness of the high-profile violent crimes, coupled with citizens becoming more aware of crime through e-mail reports by groups such as the alliance, has residents feeling uneasy.
"Is it safer? It is really hard to say," Denby said. "Just when you think it is getting better, something awful happens. I think it is the boldness of what is going on that is getting to us. They don't happen often but when they do, you remember them."
On Nov. 22, Charles Boyer was shot to death when he and his girlfriend tried to flee robbers near her Virginia-Highland apartment. On Nov. 23, a woman was raped in a Grant Park home after three men tied up her two male roommates after one of the roommates was kidnapped on the street. Police arrested three men in that incident. As of Monday, no one has been arrested in the Boyer case.
In November, a woman returned to her home in the Reunion Place subdivision in southwest Atlanta and discovered burglars inside the house. She sounded her horn and the thieves fled, but not before one assailant shot four times in her direction, with a bullet striking her car, said Don Jeanne, head of the neighborhood association. No arrest has been made in that case.
"Its not like there is a crime wave," said Jeanne, noting the subdivision had gone 19 days without a burglary as of Monday. "The people responsible are probably the same crew."
Kathy Boehmer, public safety chair for the Home Park Neighborhood Improvement Association, said her community next to Georgia Tech has been safer this year. She credited increased patrols by Atlanta and Georgia Tech police and a series of special police details for pushing criminals out.
Boehmer noted that even car burglaries were way down, partly because Georgia Tech students were not leaving laptops in vehicles as much as they had previously. However, Boehmer still doesn't feel safe in the neighborhood. If she she has to go out to her car parked on the street at night, she takes her dog as a bodyguard.
"I still don't feel safe walking through my neighborhood at night because those guys are still out there," she said. "I think people are learning not to make themselves a target."
Staff writer Bill Torpy contributed to this article.
