The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio filed a record number of violent crime indictments in Fiscal Year 2019 as part of a strategy to help drive down homicides and fatal overdoses. This is reflected in places like Mansfield, which has experienced a decrease in one of those areas.
The office indicted 1,061 people in FY 2019. That includes 308 people indicted for violent crime offenses, the highest number in the office’s records, which date back to 2004.
It also includes 456 people indicted for drug offenses – the highest number since 2005 and nearly double the amount of people indicted in just two years ago.
“The revitalized Project Safe Neighborhoods program is a major success,” said Attorney General William P. Barr. “It packs a powerful punch by combining advanced data with local leadership, further reducing violence in communities across the country and improving overall public safety. U.S. Attorneys continue to focus their enforcement efforts against the most violent criminals and work in partnership with federal, state, local, and tribal police. The Justice Department’s relationships across the board have never been stronger.”
“Our office is proud to demonstrate that we are doing what is necessary to help reduce violent crime in Northern Ohio,” U.S. Attorney Justin Herdman said. “Thanks to the incredible work of our law enforcement partners, we are able to hold accountable people who point a loaded gun at someone while robbing them, sell the fentanyl and other drugs killing our neighbors, illegally have firearms after a criminal conviction, or any of the other types of crimes we handle in federal court.”
According to FBI’s Uniform Crime Report released this week, the violent crime rate decreased nationally for the second consecutive year, down 3.9 percent from the 2017 numbers.
In Toledo, homicides are down 19 percent over this time last year. Homicides in Cleveland are down nearly 10 percent over the same period last year. Homicides are down slightly in Akron and Mansfield and are flat in Canton.
The Department of Justice in 2017 reinvigorated its nationwide violent crime reduction program, Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN). Drawing from academic research and decades of experience, the program is based on the fundamental principle that law enforcement agencies and communities must work together to address violent crime to make our neighborhoods safer.
PSN is an evidence-based violent crime reduction program that takes a collaborative approach to public safety. It leverages law enforcement and community partnerships, along with strategic enforcement efforts, to focus on the most violent criminals in the most violent locations.
Independent academic research found that PSN successfully reduced violent crime by an average of 4–20 percent, with reductions as high as 42 percent in certain locations. In 2017, the Department enhanced its PSN program, emphasizing data-driven strategies that focus on the most violent offenders, new technologies, and above all, partnerships with a wide range of stakeholders in local communities. With these changes, the program will be more effective than ever to help make America safer.
PSN brings together federal, state, local and tribal law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and community leaders to identify the most pressing violent crime problems in a community and develop comprehensive solutions to address them.
The foundations of the PSN strategy are:
- Community-Based –Each local program is contoured to fit the specific violent crime problem in that district.
- Targeted – Utilizes law enforcement and community intelligence, along with cutting-edge technology, to identify and target the most violent offenders for enforcement action.
- Comprehensive – Directs United States Attorneys to marry enforcement efforts with support of prevention and reentry strategies to truly combat violent crime in a lasting way.
In the Northern District of Ohio, U.S. Attorney Herdman worked with local police, community partners, federal agencies and other partners to identify violent crime and narcotics trafficking as two of the most pressing threats to public safety. He established a Violent Crime Unit in the office and began working with others to implement strategies designed to identify, disrupt and prosecute those responsible for the firearms violence in Northern Ohio, as well as the drug traffickers and distributors who have played a role in the record number of overdose deaths in Ohio over the past several years.
He also took steps to strengthen existing partnerships and build new ones in an effort to prevent future generations from being drawn into a life of crime and/or addiction. We office also continues to work in partnership with others to implement comprehensive reentry strategies, so people returning home from prison are equipped with the tools to lead productive lives moving forward.
The impact of these strategies can be seen in both the number and types of cases the office has prosecuted in recent years.
Source: U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Ohio
