GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ) – Violent crime in the city of Green Bay is up about 12.5 percent from 2015.
That’s according to Green Bay Police Chief Andrew Smith, who spoke with FOX 11.
Smith says he defines violent crime as murders, sexual assaults, robberies and aggravated assaults. Aggravated assaults included shootings and stabbings.
“There have been fluctuations throughout the years; I would say generally between 250 and 300 violent crimes per year is what we’ve seen,” Smith said. “The high was 301 in 2014. (The violent crime rate) went down last year, and I’m hoping we can drive that number down this year.”
Here is breakdown of the aggravated assault numbers, according to Smith:
- 2016 (so far): 83 aggravated assaults
- 2015: 265 aggravated assaults
- 2014: 301 aggravated assaults
- 2013: 264 aggravated assaults
- 2012: 290 aggravated assaults
- 2011: 242 aggravated assaults
- 2010: 263 aggravated assaults
- 2009: 260 aggravated assaults
“We’re on par to be little up above where we were last year. According to my calculations, we are about four percent above in aggravated assaults compared to last year,” said Smith.
Smith says most of the people committing the violent crimes are not from Green Bay.
“One of the things we are seeing is that the violent crimes specifically the shootings in this town seem to be caused by most people from outside of town. They come here they are involved in the narcotics trade, they get involved with a dispute with another person involved in the narcotics trade, a low level dispute, maybe 20 bucks worth of marijuana and they end up pulling out a gun and shooting each other,” said Smith.
Proactive steps are being taken, according to Smith, to combat violent crime by making police officers more visible throughout the city.
“Just these past two weeks I’ve moved seven officers from administrative assignments back out into the field to work patrol, so you’ll be seeing more police officers out there even though we haven’t increased the total number of officers we just readjusted them back out into the patrol side,” Smith explained.
