Violent crime stats show drop

Jen Lawson

Wednesday, May 26, 2004 | 10:37 a.m.

North Las Vegas has long been perceived by many in the valley as a city plagued by violent crime, but statistics released this week by the FBI show violent crime there dropped by 10.5 percent last year.

An emphasis on community-oriented policing and alert citizens have contributed to the decrease in murders, rapes, robberies and aggravated assaults, city officials said.

"The public image of North Las Vegas is changing, but some people still feel crime is high," Mayor Michael Montandon said Tuesday. "We'll keep continuing to push those numbers down and down."

Robberies declined more than any other violent crime, going down by 26 percent in 2003 compared with 2002. The report shows 332 were reported last year and 449 the year before.

Rapes also showed a decrease, from 57 in 2002 to 48 last year, which is a 15.8 percent drop.

The news is especially good, Montandon said, considering North Las Vegas is one of the fastest-growing cities in the United States, with 1,000 new people moving in every month.

Regardless of the statistics, North Las Vegas' gang-banging "Northtown" image is hard to shake, officials and authorities acknowledge.

A questionnaire asking residents to rate how they feel about their city was sent in January to 1,200 households. Of the 275 who returned their completed survey, 68 percent said they feel unsafe when it comes to violent crime and 73 feel unsafe regarding property crime.

Growth typically brings an increase in crime, and while that wasn't the case last year in the violent crime category, North Las Vegas did have more motor vehicle thefts and burglaries in 2003.

Officer Tim Bedwell, spokesman for the department, called vehicle theft in North Las Vegas "an epidemic."

Car theft rose 17 percent in 2003 from the year before, according to the report. There were 1,781 vehicles reported stolen in 2003 and 1,519 in 2002.

"We are trying right now to decide how best to deal with that," Bedwell said, including mapping where the thefts are occurring and increasing patrols of those areas.

The "Watch Your Car" program, adopted by Metro and Henderson police, might help, he said. If drivers don't usually drive between 1 and 5 a.m, they can enroll in the program, authorizing police to stop their vehicle during those hours to ensure it's not being driven by a thief.

But the program isn't a cure-all, Bedwell said, pointing out that car thefts also occur during the day, and many are found blocks away after being used for joyriding.

Burglaries also jumped by 7.7 percent, to 1,642 last year from 1,525 the year before, according to the report.

Although some crimes will climb because of North Las Vegas' increase in population, the growth boom has another positive aspect: Newcomers will judge the city based on its strengths instead of remembering 1996 and 2001, when 29 and 20 homicides occurred, respectively, police said.

Last year, the city had 18 homicides, one fewer than in 2002.

"We still value communities that gained that reputation, which are along Lake Mead" Boulevard, Bedwell said. "Those are the communities we are targeting for help."

About a year and a half ago the police department embraced the concept of community-oriented policing, in which the same officers are assigned to certain areas so they can become familiar with the neighborhood and its residents.

Other city departments, such as code enforcement, team up with police and residents to solve neighborhood problems.

"What we're trying to do is go into each of the neighborhoods and find out what their needs are and what crimes we need to target," Bedwell said. "We're very committed to community policing. We think it's a good approach."

For example, police, residents and code enforcement are cleaning up crime-attracting eyesores such as junk cars and graffiti.

Another way for police to drive down crime and keep it there is by encouraging residents to form or join block watches. More than 200 of them currently exist in North Las Vegas.

"Everybody needs a Mrs. Kravitz," Montandon said, referring to the nosy neighbor on the 1960s television comedy "Bewitched."

Donald Gibbons, 77, has been block-watch coordinator in his neighborhood in the area near Craig Road and Decatur Boulevard for about seven years. He gets more than 20 calls per week from neighbors who have concerns or complaints.

Some of the calls he receives are about pigeons or about neighbors' unruly lawns. But others are more serious, such as reports of drug activity or suspicious characters driving or walking slowly down the street, possibly looking for a door to kick in or property to steal.

Neighbors must become acquainted, find out what types of cars they drive, learn children's names and become familiar with each other's schedules so they can recognize when things don't seem right.

"Everyone has to get involved, no matter what race, nationality or religion," Gibbons said. "We have to get together and get to know one another."

Donna Shaw, 44, who has lived in the master-planned El Dorado community for two years, became block captain a year ago.

If a block watch had been in effect when her house was being built, it might have saved her and her family a lot of trouble, she said.

Vandals smashed the lights, threw paint around and hurled cans of fruit at the walls, pushing back their move-in date by two months.

"I think a neighborhood watch is very important to keep down crime," Shaw said, adding that she won't hesitate to approach neighbors and remind them to close their garage doors.

Fifty-seven-year-old Robert Evans doubles as block captain and president of the homeowner's association at his Silverwood Ranch subdivision.

Evans said joined the block watch "because the police can't be everywhere all the time."

"They're relying on citizens more and more and we can't take a back seat to it," he said. "I want to see the neighborhood watches continue to grow. We need to be more proactive as citizens."