Summer Of 2008 - The Safest In L.A. In The Past 40 Years

According to the Daily News, the summer of 2008 was the safest summer since 1967 in Los Angeles.  In the summer of 2008, homicides fell to the lowest level since 40 years ago. 

Historically, the summer months of June, July and August are violent times in Los Angles, CA.  In prior years, homicides always exceeded 100 during the summer.  However, 2008 marked the first time that summer killings fell below 100, with only 84 people killed citywide. 

This year, L.A. County made progress that was far different from years past.  Unlike 2002, where killings were at an all time high (174 homicides, making Los Angeles the homicide capital of the United States), 2008 marked a seemingly safe summer.

Police Chief William Bratton believes that the low homicide number results from collaboration with other police agencies and from police cracking down on both gang crimes and immigrants with illegal records.  Chief Bratton states, "Unemployment is up, the economy is not good. A lot of the things that so-called experts predict make crime go up is not happening here," and "We have been building momentum over the last six years. I think it will continue to get better."

Chief William Bratton expects to see L.A.'s violent crime rate continue to decrease and expects that the violent crime rate will drop 5 percent by the end of the year.  With continued police focus on gang crime prevention and aggressive crack downs on all types of gang related activity, Los Angeles will surely see more safe summers in the near future.

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