By David Perry
Lowell Sun
CONCORD, N.H. — If one believes in safety in numbers, the safest state in the nation is just a few miles north of Boston.
New Hampshire repeated as the safest state in the nation in CQ Press’ Crime State rankings 2010, which compares states based on their reported statistics for six crimes: murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and motor-vehicle theft.
Massachusetts ranked 21st of the 50 states, as it did last year.
At 50th, Nevada repeated as cellar-dweller for its seventh year, and New Mexico (49) and Louisiana (48) probably won’t be bragging about the report anytime soon.
Local law-enforcement officials and observers say New Hampshire’s size, smaller population, support of law enforcement and aggressive sentencing all play a role in the ranking.
But it’s just one measure of public safety.
“If this is used by law-enforcement officials across the state, could you blame them?” says criminologist Ted Kirkpatrick, co-director of Justiceworks at the University of New Hampshire in Durham. “It’s a chance for them to say, ‘Look how good we are.’ ”
Kirkpatrick says there’s a “cringe factor” among criminologists when studies like CQ Press’ are released, since data collection, storage and delivery may vary from state to state and city to city before it reaches the FBI.
The study is “one way to look at it. Think of it as a gestalt, or an impressionistic painting rather than one done as stark realism.”
America, he says, is “obsessed” with rankings.
Local law-enforcement officials say there are real reasons New Hampshire retains its rank.
“I know New Hampshire is consistently ranked top five, top 10 in all sorts of studies, particularly livability,” says Pelham Police Chief Joseph Roark. “So I’m not surprised to hear this. It does please me.”
He says everyone from the Legislature to municipal police “take our jobs very seriously. And the penalties are strict when people offend in New Hampshire. Bail and sentencing are appropriate, and we don’t have the constraints some states do with overpopulation in our jails. And I think prevention has something to do with that.”
The less populous state “can change pretty rapidly to embrace trends.”
“New Hampshire tends to be pretty supportive of law enforcement,” says Arthur Ryan, deputy superintendent of Lowell’s Police Department. “And that extends to the court system. They take it very seriously and from what I’ve seen, tend to be a little harsher in their sentencing.
“And we tend to have more urban areas and a denser population, so there’s more opportunity for criminal activity. Their volume of crime is much lower.”
Hudson, N.H., Police Chief Jason Lavoie says New Hampshire police forces have been sharing information and working cooperatively to prevent crime, since “criminals are very mobile. We have to be more proactive.”
So far, he says, that’s working. While the national average of solved burglaries is 12.3 percent, it is 24.7 percent in Hudson.
“It might sound funny, but our people take it very personally when a crime is committed in Hudson,” Lavoie says.
He also says he is embracing ways to eradicate crime at its root. Rather than just locking folks up, “we look at health issues, too. There are some bad people out there, but also some who need treatment for mental health.”
Sentencing is often accompanied by treatment, which “reduces recidivism,” says Lavoie.
“I’m not sure there’s a real good answer to” why rates are low in New Hampshire, says Kirkpatrick. “There will be people who say it’s because we’re nicer. There might be something about it you could attribute to community and place.”
He says the state’s gun owners tend to spring from a culture of hunting and not random violence.
“It’s not like they’re Saturday Night Specials traded on the streets of L.A.,” Kirkpatrick says.
He notes that crime statistics have been falling across the nation over the past 15 years, but thanks to a news cycle where “when something bad happens, it is played over and over,” fear of crime has not subsided.
“I’m not sure a study like this will do much to diminish fear of crime, but it would be nice.”
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