Saturday, 30 Nov 2024

Suspected teen robbers contribute to 33% rise in Central Park crime

Crime in Central Park shot up last year, including an uptick in robberies believed to have been committed by teens, police said.

Total major crimes in the green space rose from 52 in 2018 to 69 in 2019 — a 33-percent increase, NYPD data shows.

Robberies were up from 15 to 21 in the same period, and five of them were committed by teens in the park’s northwestern section — not far from Harlem’s Morningside Park, where Barnard College freshman Tessa Majors was murdered in a botched robbery by teenage suspects.

Roughly 80 percent of the 21 robberies recorded in 2019 occurred on secluded, dimly lit paths, police said.

The trend was described as “disturbing,” by the precinct’s deputy inspector, Naoki Yaguchi, at a community council meeting last week, The West Side Rag reported.

Grand larcenies were up from 28 to 37 over the same period, and burglaries and car thefts ticked up from 0 to 1, data shows.

Last year saw the highest number of robberies since 2016, when 23 were recorded, NYPD data shows.

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