Valley Crime Increases at Twice the Rate of the Rest of L. A. : Statistics: Police release figures showing that Part One offenses--including homicide, rape and robbery--rose 2.4% locally, 1% elsewhere in the city.

Crime in the San Fernando Valley, led by increases in homicides, rapes, robberies and burglaries, grew at a rate that was more than twice that of the rest of the city of Los Angeles.

Statistics released by Los Angeles police Monday showed that Part One crimes--including homicide, rape, robbery, assault, burglary, auto theft and other kinds of thefts--rose 2.4% in the Valley during 1990.

The same kinds of crime rose 1% in the rest of the city for the same period.

Although the overall rise in the Valley is small, police said it was still distressing, particularly because violent crimes rose significantly.

Cmdr. Chet Spencer of the Valley Bureau said police are concerned by statistics that show the number of homicides jumping 13.3% to 128 during the year. In 1989, there were 113 killings in the Valley.

Of the five police divisions in the Valley, Van Nuys had the most homicides with 39--an increase over the 30 recorded in 1989 and even more dramatic when contrasted with the 18 homicides investigated in 1988.

Detective James Vojtecky, head of the Van Nuys homicide unit, said gangs and drugs were responsible for the increase.

“Half of our cases involve gangs or the combination of gangs and drugs,” he said.

Vojtecky said the gangs involved in the slayings are not new to the area but are increasingly involved in drug sales, which often lead to violent confrontations. He said it is a police axiom that narcotics activity breeds violence.

“There is just too much money being made,” he said.

The rise in homicides in the Van Nuys Division is inversely reflected in the Foothill Division, which includes the northeast Valley.

Slayings in the Foothill Division, once the annual leader in homicides, have dropped from 45 in 1988 to 33 in 1989 and 30 last year.

Police said increased gang crackdowns may be a factor in the decrease, but Detective Al Ferrand said that determining the reasons for increases and decreases in killings is difficult. “Maybe the word is just getting out that if you commit a murder in Foothill, you go to prison,” he said.

Police also saw positive aspects in the Devonshire Division, which includes the northwest Valley, where overall crime dropped about 2%. It is the only division in the Valley to experience a decrease.

The division includes Sepulveda, where police set up barricades in late 1989 in two 12-square-block neighborhoods in which drug activity and other crime was rampant.

Spencer said the extreme measure resulted in a major decrease in crimes reported in the neighborhoods in 1990.

“That is a significant accomplishment,” Spencer said. “We believe that it contributed to the decrease of crime in the division.”

In specific crime classifications, reported rapes rose 7.5% to 472 in the Valley and robberies rose 7.7% to 4,994 reports during 1990.

Burglaries jumped nearly 10% to 15,652 reports during the year, and aggravated assaults rose 4.5% to 10,206 reports.

Auto thefts rose only 2% during the year but still remained one of the Valley’s most frequent crimes. In the Valley, 19,533 vehicles were reported stolen last year, or about 53 a day.

Meantime, car break-ins and thefts--crimes reported thousands of times each year--decreased, causing the overall rate to rise only slightly.