Violent Crimes Rose 25% in 1989

The number of violent crimes in the city of Glendale went up by 25% in 1989 over 1988 and property crimes also increased, statistics released by the Glendale Police Department show, but the per capita crime rate is expected to remain among the lowest in the state.

Glendale Police Chief David Thompson attributed the increase to population growth, the rise in gang activities and a reclassification of certain crimes.

However, he said, per capita crime rates remain close to 1988 levels.

“Crime will continue to go up and our task is to manage that growth,” Thompson said in an interview Wednesday. “But we still live in a safe city.”

The biggest increase was registered in the number of rape and attempted rape reports, up 68.7%, from 32 in 1988 to 54 in 1989.

Jack Altounian, police department crime analyst, said that despite the increase, Glendale has one of the lowest rape rates in the state.

“Our rape rate has always been among the lowest in the country and the state, and comparatively is still low for a city the size of Glendale,” he said. Of the 54 reports, 34 were of attempted rapes and 20 of rapes, he said.

Thompson attributed the increase in rape reports to the growing awareness of the problem due to films and television specials on the subject. He said most rape reports in the city are of family and date rapes, and that there were no serial rapes in Glendale in 1989.

The other three offenses classed as violent crimes--murder, robbery and aggravated assault--were also up in 1989. There were seven murders, compared to six in 1988, and robbery and aggravated assault both increased by 22% to 271 each.

Thompson said part of the increase was “simply because we have a serious explosion of gang activity. A lot of gang crimes compound each other because they lead to retaliation, and many are aggravated by the use of alcohol and drugs.”

He said the formation of a full-time gang detail last December has begun to reduce gang activities but statistics are not yet available.

Thompson also credited the Los Angeles district attorney’s office with adopting tougher prosecution policies against gangs. He said the district attorney is increasingly willing to prosecute gang members for conspiracy to commit crimes as opposed to filing charges only after a crime has been committed.

Thompson said that in two cases in 1989, the district attorney’s office filed gang-related conspiracy charges in Glendale, encouraging detectives to build conspiracy cases against other gang members, which he hopes will reduce their criminal activity.

Crimes against property--burglary, theft, stolen vehicles and arson--rose by a combined total of 5.7%. The highest increase in this category was registered in commercial crimes, up from 840 in 1988 to 1,117 in 1989.

Capt. Thomas Rutkoske, chief of detectives, attributed the growth to an increase of commercial activity in the Glendale Galleria and a reclassification of what constitutes burglary.

In the past, he said, most shoplifters were booked on misdemeanor shoplifting charges. But increasingly, he added, as police investigators improve their ability to prove premeditated intent to steal, shoplifters are charged with burglary instead.

By contrast, the residential burglary rate dropped 10% to 760, the result of aggressive community outreach and Neighborhood Watch programs, he said.

Arson and stolen vehicle cases were slightly higher than in 1988.

The city’s per capita crime rate, for eight categories of crimes used in FBI statistics, will remain close to the 1988 rate of about 5,500 per 100,000 inhabitants, Altounian said.

An exact per capita rate is difficult to figure because of the city’s rapid population growth, he said. His projections were based on a population of 160,000, but city officials estimate the city’s true population is closer to 190,000, which would decrease the per capita crime rate.

In 1988, Glendale had the sixth-lowest per capita crime rate in the state, Altounian said, and so the city is now probably one of the five safest cities in California.