For the First Time In 25 Years, New York City Went A Weekend Without a Single Shooting

From Friday, October 12 through Sunday, October 14 last year, not a single shooting was reported in New York City’s five boroughs, according to police. This was the first time of such an occurrence in at least 25 years. In a city of at least 8.6 million people, the achievement was extraordinary. The weekend came after a historically low number of shootings in September and after eight consecutive quarters of declining shootings.

NYPD’s chief of crime-control strategies, Lori Pollock, said to CNN in October 2018 the city was trending toward another “record-setting” year of fewer than 97,000 crimes and attributed the decline in shootings in part to cooperation with federal authorities in prosecuting domestic violence offenders for weapons possession. The efforts have worked — in 1990 the city experienced a jaw-dropping 2,245 homicides, compared to 287 in 2018.

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This story was originally featured in Issue 06 of the Goodnewspaper.

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