SERIOUS CRIME DOWN 10% IN FIRST HALF OF YEAR

Surprisingly Big Drop Tops 7 1/2 Years Of Decline

WASHINGTON - The number of serious crimes reported to police plunged by 10
percent in the first half of this year, an unusually large drop that
extended the nationwide crime decline to 71/2 years, the FBI said yesterday.

Led by drops of 13 percent in murders, 14 percent in burglaries and 12
percent in auto thefts, the declining crime rate surprised experts. The
overall crime figure declined by only 5 percent, 4 percent and 3 percent in
the preceding three first-half-year reports.

This year, among other violent crimes, robbery dropped 10 percent; rape, 8
percent; and aggravated assault, 7 percent. In other property crime,
larceny-theft dropped 8 percent. Nationally, the report gives only
percentage changes between the first six months of 1999 and of 1998.

The federal figures follow last week's release of the California crime
Index, which showed that violent crime in all major Bay Area cities also
decreased during the first six months of this year, except in Oakland and
Hayward, where it increased sharply, according to a state attorney
general's report. The California statistical study showed that San
Francisco, San Jose, Concord, Daly City, Fremont, Santa Rosa, Sunnyvale and
Vallejo all had decreases in violent crime. Berkeley had a negligible
increase.

While violent crime increased in Oakland and Hayward, the study notes,
those two cities joined all the others in a decrease in their overall crime
rate, which includes property crimes such as burglary. "These drops are
enormous and encouraging," said Carnegie Mellon University professor Alfred
Blumstein, speaking of the national figures.

"This is astounding," said James Alan Fox, a professor of criminal justice
at Northeastern University. "No one could have predicted the drops would
have been this deep."

As for explanations, experts cited federal, state and local anti-crime
measures, a growing economy, the aging of baby boomers and the decline of
crack cocaine markets.

But Fox also discerned "a reverse contagion effect."

"Lawfulness is becoming the norm, and it's contagious," he said.

"Cities around the country are investing in crime programs as never before.
Rather than hiding behind double-locked doors, citizens are getting
involved in their communities."

He and Blumstein also mentioned the growth of community policing, expanded
incarceration of criminals, crime prevention and anti-gun efforts by
federal and local authorities.

The big city murder figure also is influenced by New York, which saw
homicides through July 4 rise from 309 last year to 345 this year, while
all other major crimes continued to decline.

Earlier in the 71/2-year decline, big city murders including New York's saw
the steepest declines. "But 7 percent-a-year declines can't go on forever,"
Blumstein said.

Blumstein said, "In the big cities, we've gotten rid of the murderous
violence that is readily preventable through gun controls, drug market
changes and the strength of the economy. At some point, we end up with a
wide variety of personal disputes."

The big city murder figures were the leading indicators of the crime
decline in the 1990s, because that is where crack gangs and the guns

they gave juveniles showed up first, Blumstein said. Over time, that
problem radiated out to smaller and smaller cities. The solutions followed
the same path.

Indeed, this year's FBI figures show that basically the smaller the city,
the larger the decline in murders. The three groups of cities between I
million and 100,000 population showed murder declines of 11 through 14
percent. The three groups between 10,000 and 100,000 showed murder declines
of 23 through 27 percent.

"A 27 percent drop is enormous. It took time for the problem and the
solutions to reach those smallest cities," Blumstein said.

As before, overall crime dropped in every region and in every size
community. The declines were 12 percent in the West, 11 percent in the
Midwest, 10 percent in the Northeast, and 7 percent in the South.

Among population groups, the largest decline was in cities of 25,000 to
100,000, 11 percent; the smallest drop was in cities of more than a
million, 6 percent. Rural areas had an 11 percent decline; suburban areas,
10 percent.