On Thursday, Oct. 1, District E13 of the Boston Police Department (BPD) hosted its monthly virtual police and community relations meeting. The meeting is an opportunity for members of the public to ask questions of local law enforcement.
At every meeting, officers provide copies of year-to-date crime statistics. One chart examines Part One crime data. Part One crimes are more serious in nature, and don’t include lesser crimes such as vandalism, drug dealing or illegal possession of firearms.
According to the summary, Part One crime is down four percent in the city of Boston compared to this time last year. Jamaica Plain is beating the citywide reduction in Part One crime. So far this year, there have been 613 reported crimes, compared to 721 last year, a decrease of 15 percent. Of the 12 BPD districts, only Districts A1 (Downtown) and E18 (Hyde Park) saw a greater year-to-year decrease.
Crimes that saw a decrease so far this year include homicide, rape and attempted, non-domestic aggravated assault, residential and other burglary, other larceny and auto theft. Crimes that saw an uptick compared to 2019 include robbery and attempted, domestic aggravated assault, commercial burglary, and larceny from a motor vehicle.
A second chart compared the statistics of fatal and nonfatal shootings from 2019 to 2020. Jamaica Plain saw 15 shootings so far this year, up from 14 in 2019. That is almost a quarter of the shootings in Districts B2 (Roxbury) and B3 (Mattapan). However, it accounted for just 6.85 percent of citywide shootings this year, down from 8.8 percent in 2019.
The police and community relations meeting is held on the first Thursday of the month at 6:30pm. The next meeting is scheduled for Thursday, Nov. 5. To join the meeting, go to meet.google.com and enter the meeting code hgf-fdjq-cui. You can also join the meeting by phone by dialing 1-720-507-3856 and entering the code 724 468 894 followed by the pound or hashtag sign.