Violent crime increases in Costa Mesa

The number of robberies, serious assaults and burglaries in Costa Mesa increased during 2014, but a drop in the area’s most common offense, theft, still netted the city an overall decrease in last year’s reported crime rate, according to numbers released by the Police Department this week.

Costa Mesa notched a 0.76% total decrease last year in what are known as Part 1 crimes, which the federal government classifies as as homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, theft, auto theft and arson.

However, violent crime — homicide, rape, robbery and aggravated assault — jumped 27% in that same period.

The number of robberies rose from 94 to 120, and aggravated assaults increased from 111 to 153. Aggravated assault is an attack likely to cause severe injury.

Rape remained flat at 45 reports last year, and there were no homicides, according to the department’s statistics.

Police said that 174 fewer thefts in 2014 led an overall 2% decline in property crime, but every other crime in that category showed at least some increase.

Burglaries increased by 11.9% to 573 instances. There were 308 stolen vehicles, an uptick of 4%. And arsons rose to 18 from 13.

Although police didn’t cite any one reason to explain the violent crime increase, they did point to California’s drive to reduce prison overcrowding as a factor.

The so-called realignment program that started in 2011 puts released convicts who are considered non-violent under the supervision of county and local agencies rather than state parole.

Costa Mesa saw a bump of about 10% in its violent crime rate the year after realignment was enacted.

Over the same time period, police ranks in the city have contracted. The City Council voted to reduce the department’s staffing in 2011, and dozens of officers began leaving the agency while the police union and some council members butted heads over reductions to benefits and pensions.

Since then, the department has been unable to fill its ranks. In October, there were 29 vacancies at the department that would staff 136 sworn officers if it were at capacity.

“Our police department’s focus at this time is to aggressively train newer officers and to expeditiously upstaff our patrol complement to better impact this trend throughout the upcoming year,” Costa Mesa police spokesman Greg Scott said.