How bad is New York City’s real crime problem?
Look at the hideous new recidivism numbers pointed out by Mayor Adams and Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch at their year-end crime-stat press conference Monday.
Since 2018, the city has seen recidivism skyrocket: Among offenders with three or more arrests in a single year for the same crime, numbers are up a whopping 147% for those charged with felony assault and 119% for grand larceny-auto.
For robbery?
Up 83%.
Grand larceny saw a 71% jump in recidivists; the rise was 64% for shoplifting and 61% for burglary.
These are not good people who stumbled into crime by bad luck.
They’re not victims of poverty or any other social ailment.
They’re hardened and hard-core repeat offenders, committing crimes with what is clearly ever-increasing enthusiasm and impunity.
Like subway slasher Jamar Banks, who had racked up 54 arrests for various violent and property crimes, yet was roaming loose prior to an underground knifing spree that injured two in two separate incidents.
Why are people like Banks left free to commit ever more crimes?
Why do they feel they have the space to do so?
Because in Gotham cops and prosecutors are hobbled by city and state laws meant to keep crooks free and happy while constraining the people responsible for public safety.
Above all, the state’s disastrous 2019 bail-reform law: Being picked up and let go because their crimes no longer qualify for bail is a signal feature of the recidivists Adams and Tisch highlighted.
Or the discovery “law “reforms” that hamper prosecutors with insane paperwork requirements (that one’s so bad even Democratic legislators want to see it changed).
These recidivism numbers blow up the progressive lie that violent crooks are good people caught in bad situations.
The Post warned at the time that the 2019 bail law and every other progressive justice “reform” move would erode public safety — which these numbers prove it has, despite a small but welcome year-on-year crime drop.
This is not an issue we wanted to be right about. But we were and are.
New York’s electeds need to admit they were wrong — and fix it.
