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Crime on decline, FDLE report says

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By RONNIE BLAIR | The Tampa Tribune

Published: February 22, 2012

NEW PORT RICHEY - The number of crimes reported in 2011 in unincorporated Pasco County showed a 3.5 percent drop from 2010, but Sheriff Chris Nocco on Tuesday said that statistics alone don't determine whether crime fighting is successful.

"Stats are not what we judge ourselves on," Nocco said. "Stats ebb and flow."

Instead, the sheriff said he prefers to look at his deputies' success in breaking up crime rings or using intelligence-led policing to make neighborhoods safer. Crime statistics are a tool to help with that effort, he said, rather than a be all and end all.

"It's also perception," Nocco said. "We have people in (some) neighborhoods who don't feel safe to go out at night. If you don't feel safe, statistics don't mean anything."

In 2011, 13,570 crimes were reported in Pasco, down from 14,065 the previous year, according to the report compiled by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.

The statistics are for areas within the sheriff's office's jurisdiction, which takes in about 89 percent of the county, sheriff's spokesman Kevin Doll said.

Crimes committed in the city limits of Dade City, Zephyrhills, New Port Richey and Port Richey are not included because those municipalities have their own police departments.

Most individual categories of crimes, such as robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny and motor vehicle theft, were all down from the previous year.

The county had 11 murders in 2011, which was up from eight in 2010. Forcible sex offenses also increased from 131 to 136.

In all, the sheriff's office made 19,029 arrests in 2011, up from 18,505 in 2010. Of the people arrested, 13,454 were male and 5,575 were female. The total arrests included 1,612 juveniles.

The index-crime rate of 3,175.1 crimes per 100,000 people was down 9.2 percent from the previous year and at its lowest level since 1995. The rate can't be compared to the years before that because the formula for calculating crime rate changed that year, Doll said.

Nocco said one reason he prefers to look at crime statistics as a tool rather than a measurement of success is that they don't work like a sporting contest, where eventually the game ends and there's a final score.

"There is never a final score for crime statistics," he said.

rblair@tampatrib.com (813) 371-1853

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