Crime continues to drop, report shows

Crime rates in Ramona continue to decline with violent and property crime rates falling about 22 percent during the first half of 2015 when compared to the same period last year, according to a report released last week.

Lt. Richard Williams of the San Diego County Sheriff’s station in Ramona attributed the drop to “hard work by deputies and good partnership with the community,” along with intelligence-led policing.

San Diego Association of Governments’ mid-year 2015 report on crime showed overall the San Diego region’s violent and property crime rates fell about 1 percent.

Not all crime categories reflected a decrease for Ramona — rape, robbery and motor vehicle thefts rose — but Williams said that is partly due to legislative changes.

Five rapes were reported in the first half of this year as compared to one rape in the same period last year, but SANDAG noted that a comparison is difficult because in 2015 the definition of rape changed and it is now more inclusive and no longer requires force.

“It’s hard to do apples to apples comparisons,” said Williams.

Motor vehicle thefts also increased in Ramona, from seven in the first half of 2014 to 10 in the first half of this year; however, Williams said some of those were situations where a family member or known suspect took a vehicle.

Instead of one robbery in the first half of last year, there were two by mid-year 2015: a robbery at Bank of America in February, and a shoplifting incident at Albertsons in June where the suspect — a local gang member — pulled a knife out and threatened a security guard, said Williams. That suspect was arrested and pled guilty, he said. Because the other robbery involved a financial institution, it was handled by the FBI.

Williams points to AB 109, the public safety realignment that went into effect in October 2011 and shifts responsibilities for non-violent criminals from the state to the local level, and Proposition 47 that was passed by voters in November 2014 and reduces certain felonies to misdemeanors, as playing roles in some crime cases. Across the state, Williams said, there has been an increase in larceny-type cases because of Prop 47, with offenders knowing the threshold to keep their crime a misdemeanor rather than a felony.

“We have to adjust our strategies based on the current statutes,” he said.

In Ramona, larceny cases decreased from 92 in the mid-year 2014 report to 78 in this year’s report.

Residential burglaries dropped from 26 to 19, and non-residential burglaries fell from 14 to 4 in the mid-year report. Aggravated assaults declined from 33 to 17 cases.

The lieutenant said his station does a lot of research and data analysis, looks for trends, and will focus on those areas where they saw an increase in cases.