The Associated Press
DETROIT (AP) -- Law enforcement officials credited an increased number of state and federal prosecutions for gun-related crimes with helping to reduce violent crime.
The prosecutions, along with increased public input about crimes and a leveling off in shootings, are seen as the results of a partnership between federal and local authorities that began in April 2002, The Detroit News reported in a Friday story.
Jeffrey Collins, U.S. attorney for eastern Michigan, said Thursday that under Project Safe Neighborhoods the number of gun cases referred to his office has doubled since 2001.
In that year, his office prosecuted 127 cases. Last year, it was 216, and so far this year the number has increased to 252.
Federal convictions are up 61 percent, with average sentences of five years in prison. Since the program began, another 2,016 people have been convicted in Wayne County Circuit Court of using a firearm while committing a felony, a crime with a mandatory two-year prison term.
Reported shootings in Detroit through November this year are down 2 percent from last year and down 21 percent from November 2001.
Federal and local authorities credited Safe Neighborhoods as a leading reason that Detroit is likely to post its lowest homicide count for a year since 1968, when it had 389. Through Monday, the city had 348, keeping it on pace for about one slaying per day. The city has not had fewer than that since it had 281 killings in 1967.
The city’s murder rate has fallen 11 percent so far this year. By comparison, the murder rate nationally went up 1.1 percent in the first half of the year, according to recently released preliminary FBI figures.
The city’s homicide rate remains substantially higher than the national rate, but Wayne County Prosecutor Michael Duggan said Detroit has made great strides.
“We have turned the corner on the murder rate here in Detroit,” he said. “It’s taken 36 years to get to this point.”