Palm Bay’s Mid-Year Crime Stats Reveal Overall Decline In Crime

By  //  August 14, 2015

Palm-Bay--Mid-Year-Crime-Report-2015
Data submitted to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) Uniform Crime Report (UCR) shows a 10-percent drop in the crime rate for the first six months of 2015 compared to the same period in 2014.

BREVARD COUNTY • PALM BAY, FLORIDA – Data submitted to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement (FDLE) Uniform Crime Report (UCR) shows a 10-percent drop in the crime rate for the first six months of 2015 compared to the same period in 2014.

It is the 4th consecutive year Palm Bay’s mid-year crime rate declined with the average drop at 7.4% for the 4-year time period.

Mark Renkens
Mark Renkens

“It’s great to see the numbers trending downward,” said Chief Mark Renkens of the Palm Bay Police Department.

“We certainly hope this trend continues. We will keep focusing our efforts on crime prevention and partnering with our residents and businesses to keep our city as one of the safest cities in Florida.”

In summary the mid-year data shows increases in some crimes including a 29.2 percent increase in reported robberies.

There were 31 reported robberies between January 1 and June 30th of this year compared to 24 reported during the same time period in 2014.

Overall the rate of violent crime dropped 10.7 percent including an 18.9% drop in reported aggravated assaults, and a 42.9 percent drop in sex related crimes. The number of reported property crimes also dropped in every category.

Reported burglaries were down 3.5 percent with 222 reported burglaries in the first six months of this year compared to 230 for the same period in 2014.

Reported thefts were also down by 11.5% with 667 reported in the first six months of this year compared to 754 in the same period in 2014. Of note are a significant number of officers being assaulted.

During the first six months of 2015, 34 officers were victims of assault. During the same time last year 27 officers were assaulted.

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This an increase of 25.9 percent compared to the same time last year and fast approaching the number of assaults on officers in all of 2014, which was 43.

“Officer safety is a significant concern,” Chief Renkens added.

“We are paying extra attention to improved training and the new additions at our range will make a huge impact in better preparing our officers for the increasing threats they are facing every day.”

The Palm Bay Police Department is required by Florida statute to collect and report statistical data on specific crimes and report that data to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement as part of the state’s Uniform Crime Report (UCR).

The specific crimes are called index crimes which, are tracked uniformly across all jurisdictions.

These index crimes are collected from all law enforcement agencies in the state and are meant to provide an accurate summary of crime data that meet the minimum requirements of the National Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) program.

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It also functions as way to maintain agency statistics and provide a barometer of the number of index crimes that occur in a community, determine crime and clearance rates and ascertain how often crime occurs.

Since crime is a sociological phenomenon influenced by a variety of factors, this data is not meant to be used as a measurement of law enforcement effectiveness.