Hoping to make Jamaica safer than ever this summer, the NYPD is dispatching additional officers to the precinct responsible for protecting the neighborhood.
The 103rd Precinct is one of eight commands across the city receiving reinforcements during the fourth-annual “Summer All-Out” program. According to the NYPD, the commands patrol some of the city’s “historically high crime neighborhoods,” and the extra officers will help continue an overall historic reduction in crime across the city.
“During summer all-out in 2017, the city experienced significant reductions in shootings and murders in commands where additional police officers were assigned,” the NYPD noted in a June 14 statement. “In 2017 summer all-out commands, there was a reduction of eight murders, [down] 30.8 percent, and 44 shootings, [down] 47.3 percent.”
The extra officers will undergo a one-day refresher training course on neighborhood policing and de-escalation techniques before being sent out on patrol.
“The all-out officers will be deployed precisely where the violence is still occurring. Their professional presence is a deterrent to crime. It also provides a measure of comfort to residents of that neighborhood,” said NYPD Chief of Department Terence A. Monahan. “This is crucial because it doesn’t matter if crime statistics are showing the city is safe, and getting safer, even if every single New Yorker doesn’t actually feel they are safe.”
The 103rd Precinct includes Jamaica and Hollis, covering an area generally bounded by Hillside Avenue on the north, Francis Lewis Boulevard on the east, Hollis Avenue, 109th Avenue, Brinckerhoff Avenue and 111th Avenue on the south, and the Van Wyck Expressway on the west.
Through June 3, according to the latest CompStat statistics on the 103rd Precinct website, major crimes are slightly down in the command, with 587 incidents reported year-to-date, down from 592 through the same period in 2017. Just one murder occurred through the period (there had been two cases through June 3, 2017), and there were 13 rape cases, up from 10 last year.
While grand larcenies and auto thefts are down, robberies and burglaries increased in the precinct through June 3, the CompStat report noted.
