You're safer than you think

The number of homicides is rising sharply in Milwaukee; Oklahoma City; Nashville, Tenn.; Kansas City, Mo.; and other metropolitan areas, with frustrated police saying there's more anger -- and weapons -- on the streets these days. A dirty look or a feeling of being "disrespected" can trigger fatal gunfire, police officials say.

But in Seattle, the number of homicides continues to rank among the lowest per capita among large urban cities.

There were 25 homicides reported last year, roughly 40 percent fewer than a decade ago, according to statistics released Friday. And there's little evidence that there's been a spike in killings classified as arguments or sudden rage.

"The overall violent crime rate is unbelievably low for a city of this size," said Seattle police Chief Gil Kerlikowske. "It's clearly one of the safest big cities."

Seattle hasn't bucked the trend entirely. Overall violent crime edged up 8 percent in 2005, led by a 15 percent jump in aggravated assaults. Robberies increased slightly, while rapes were down 4 percent from the previous year.

When adjusted for population, the violent crime rate hasn't gone up. It's remained relatively low for the past five years, at seven crimes for every 100,000 residents.

So why is Seattle being spared the brunt of the spike in homicides? Theories abound.

It doesn't have to do with the rain, or the supposed politeness of Seattleites, experts say.

People in most cities -- even the most crime-ridden ones -- think they're polite and friendly, said Richard Rosenfeld, a criminology professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis.

Rosenfeld's city reported 131 homicides last year. The per capita rate is among the highest in the nation.

"We think of ourselves as exceptionally friendly. We pride ourselves on how slow we drive, that we wave drivers across, and yet we have a homicide rate that is five to six times yours."

Police officials and experts say that among dozens of factors, Seattle's demographics, economic prosperity, high education level and stability in terms of people moving in and out of the city may help explain the low crime rate.

"Seattle is a more affluent city than many of the cities that have continuing and high rates of violence," Rosenfeld said. "Compare Seattle to Baltimore or D.C. It's a very different place."

The area's relative prosperity "certainly contributes to the relative stability that you see in your homicide rate," he added.

Still, some criminologists caution that it's too early to say why some major cities, including New York, Chicago and Los Angeles, continue to enjoy historic lows in the number of homicides, while others are enduring a sharp rise.

"The likeliest explanation is no explanation at all," said Robert Weisberg, a law professor who heads Stanford University's Criminal Justice Center. He cautioned against drawing conclusions from short-term data.

"Is there any possibility that Oklahoma City (where the homicide rate jumped last year by 51 percent) experienced a change that Seattle didn't? I doubt it," he said. "It doesn't mean anything. It will wash out over time."

On that point, Seattle's police chief agreed. "A lot of this is luck and timing," Kerlikowske said. "It's not some special formula that someone was doing here and not elsewhere."

But he also said the city's crime rates are kept low through a combination of good police work, the willingness of residents to report crimes, downtown revitalization and community involvement. Another factor: adopting innovative crime-prevention strategies, such as having officers coordinate with community corrections staffers in each precinct.

Kerlikowske said he's concerned about the increase in aggravated assaults and the fact that more guns are being used in those crimes. The department plans to hire a gun analyst and work with the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to find out where the weapons are coming from.

Overall, property crimes in 2005 were up slightly, by nearly 2 percent, with auto thefts continuing to rise. Burglaries in the city were down 13 percent.

In Seattle, "you're a lot safer than you think you are," said criminology expert David Weisburd, who teaches at the University of Maryland and Hebrew University.

Weisburd and his colleagues recently studied and mapped 14 years' worth of Seattle crime and found that it was heavily concentrated in hot spots throughout the city. So-called "good" neighborhoods had bad spots, and "bad" neighborhoods had good spots.

But the reality was crime largely bypassed most people from 1989 to 2002, the period Weisburd studied. A small portion of street clusters accounted for about half of all police incidents.

But don't tell that to Ron Momoda, often referred to as the one-man Block Watch for Othello Park in Rainier Valley. He recalled a night last March when he was sitting down to watch a movie when he heard a sudden pop-pop-pop.

A wild shootout at Othello Playground left a 22-year-old man dead -- a gunshot wound to the head.

"Those of us who want our neighborhoods safe, we're stressed out," Momoda said.

Mona Lee, 67, who has lived in Rainier Valley for eight years, doesn't let that deter her from riding her bike around the neighborhood and joining efforts to make it safer.

"There is a high crime rate, but the crime is not something that should make people stay indoors," she said.

"If you go out ... get to know your neighbors and take care of your streets, take care of the planting strip in front of your house, pick up trash -- you'll be preventing the crime."

P-I reporter Phuong Cat Le can be reached at 206-448-8390 or phuongle@seattlepi.com.

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