January 1, 2008

The Parish Line

posted by m.d.


The NOPD says 209 people were murdered in New Orleans in 2007. I found 206 media reports of murders in 2007. For the rest of this post, I will use my numbers because I know where they came from.

In Jefferson Parish, the Sheriff’s Office reports 30 murders through September. In this December 28 T-P article, JPSO says there were 44 murders in unincorporated Jefferson Parish in 2007. I found 13 murders in October, November, and December on the JP Crime Tracker map. Add the Dec 28 murder, and that adds up to 44 in 2007.

Kenner PD says there were 9 murders or non-negligent manslaughters through October there. I can find 8 media reports or KPD press releases for murders in the same period. Since I am not sure if there was one non-negligent manslaughter, I will only count 8. I found one more media report of a murder in Kenner in November, which makes 9 total in 2007.

I know of two in Gretna. I believe there were none in the other JP cities.

That makes at least 55 murders in Jefferson Parish.

206 in New Orleans. 55 in Jefferson Parish. That’s a big difference.

Here’s a bigger difference. New Orleans has an estimated population of around 300,000. Jefferson Parish has about 445,000 people in it (98% of pre-Katrina).

206 murders with 300,000 people equals a murder rate of 68 murders per 100,000 people.

55 murders with 445,000 people equals a murder rate of 12 murders per 100,000 people.

That's a big difference.

The combined rate is better – 261 murders with 745,000 people equals a murder rate of 35 murders per 100,000 people. But, it masks the problems in the New Orleans if you combine them. Geographically, only a parish line divides New Orleans and Jefferson Parish. There should not be this big a difference.

Official numbers will come out later this year. There might be more murders in Jefferson Parish than I am counting, but not enough to catch up to New Orleans.

Graphing the murders in JP and NOLA by month using my numbers, the second half of the year stands out. When murders went down in New Orleans, they went up in JP, and vice versa.
I’ll have to think about what that means.

3 comments:

LisaPal said...

Thanks for all of your work on this.

I know I've said this before, but I'd love to see attempted murders get as much attention as murders get. The only difference between assault with a deadly weapon and murder is bad aim. The intention is the same and depending on the outcome, there's not a lot of difference in the social cost.

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