The number of shootings dropped in the city last month compared to May 2021, according to NYPD data released Friday. Overall, major crime in the city increased last month.
There were 118 recorded shooting incidents in May this year, compared to 172 in the same month last year, according to NYPD data, translating to a 31.4% decrease. The number is still double that of pre-pandemic levels, when 61 shootings were recorded in May 2019.
The NYPD attributes the decline to the Neighborhood Safety Teams, tasked with taking guns off the street. The department claims the teams have seized 105 firearms and made 115 gun arrests since they were established in March.
“We have pointed every resource we have at reducing gun violence in this city,” Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell said in a prepared statement. “We have seen seven straight weeks of shootings going down – and that is not a coincidence.”
The recent downward trend in shooting incidents comes as Mayor Eric Adams — who ran on a pledge to reduce crime — has doubled down on gun violence prevention. This week he appointed long-time community activist Andre T. Mitchell as the city’s “gun violence prevention czar.” Mitchell will meet with Sewell and Deputy Mayor for Public Safety Philip Banks III on a weekly basis to develop recommendations on how city agencies can better help neighborhoods impacted by gun violence.
Major crimes were up 27.8% last month compared to the same month last year, according to police data. There was a 42.1% increase in grand larceny, 28.3% rise in burglary and a 26.2% spike in robbery.
The continued increase in crime also comes as the city nears the summer months, generally a time when violent crime rises. In April, Adams told Politico that the city will “continue to see improvements before the summer months, when we traditionally see an increase in crime.”
