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Number of grave crimes decreases in Moscow

Police have shifted the focus from numbers to quality and crime solution

MOSCOW, January 26 (Itar-Tass) —— The crime rate in Moscow continues to decline, city police chief Vladimir Kolokoltsev said.

Police registered 173,000 crimes in 2011, a decrease of 6.6 percent from 2010. The number of registered grave and very grave crimes decreased by 10.4 percent. The number of murders, crimes involving severe harm to people’s health and death, robberies, assaults, and thefts is also steadily going down.

Police have shifted the focus from numbers to quality and crime solution, Kolokoltsev said on Wednesday, January 25.

“Last year, 2,400 crimes from previous periods were solved. This is 40 percent more than in 2010, including grave and very grave crimes by one-third,” he added.

“Twenty-one of 40 attacks on cash collectors were solved, and 49 persons were detained. The number of thefts from cars in Moscow dropped by 16 percent from 552 to 452. Twenty-nine criminal groups consisting of 90 people were detained,” he said.

Visitors commit about a half of all crimes registered in Moscow, but the overall number of such crimes is decreasing.

“One of the destabilising factors that affect the crime situation in city negatively is crimes committed by visitors – 48.5 percent of all solved crimes,” the police chief said.

Kolokoltsev stressed that this issue has always been in the focus of the city government’s attention. “Last year, the number of crimes committed by visitors decreased by 20 percent [from 2010] to 23,000. The number of crimes committed by foreigners and stateless persons dropped by 25 percent, and the number of crimes against them went down by 27 percent,” he said.

Kolokoltsev attributed the decline to joint efforts with the migration service.

“In 2011, the Federal Migration Service and we organised more than 28,400 joint events in the city, exposed over 15,600 migration offences, initiated administrative proceedings against 50,000 people and deported some 3,000,” he said.

Last year, Moscow police detained 130 people at railway stations and airports who were wanted by law enforcement agencies in other countries.

The use of new equipment helped increase the crime solution rate in Moscow. Security systems and equipment helped solve 11 murders, more than 1,600 thefts, 281 robberies, 90 assaults, and 101 crimes involving illegal drug trafficking.

A mobile crew management system allowed police to solve 1,300 crimes in hot pursuit, three times more than in 2010. Patrol cars are being equipped with GLONASS receivers. Their number in 2011 increased 2.5 times from 2010 to exceed 4,000.