645 rookie cops to hit high-crime streets

By Veronika Belenkaya
Daily News, Friday 12/28/07

There may be fewer homicides in Brooklyn's high-crime neighborhoods, but the number of people getting shot and robbed there is on the rise.

Home burglaries, car break-ins and muggings also have increased in central and north Brooklyn - even as the same crime rates have decreased citywide, NYPD statistics show.

... the 77th Precinct - where burglary is up by 15% this year over last year and robberies are up by nearly 7%.

One of the neighborhoods saw an even more deadly trend: Even as the city's murder rate hit a 45-year low, deadly assaults in the 73rd Precinct in Brownsville increased by 27.2%.

Gunshots also wounded 119 people there, up from 92 last year. It was the same grim story in Flatbush, where the number of shooting victims increased by more than 28%.

In Bedford-Stuyvesant, where the number of shooting victims rose from 71 to 91, it also be risky business to own a car: Auto theft shot up 16%, and the number of burglaries rose from 511 to 537.

Full story here.