NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell rode the subway one entire cease with cameras in tow this week — in a bid to indicate New Yorkers they’re “secure within the transit system” amid the highest homicide charges seen in 25 years underground.
Digicam crews from choose retailers — WABC, AM New York and 1010 WINS — have been invited alongside for the quick discipline journey, which befell at 8 p.m. Tuesday.
“I discovered we've got extra to do, and we’re right here to do it,” the rookie commissioner advised WABC after taking the No. 6 prepare one cease to Grand Central Station from the East 53rd Avenue-Lexington Avenue station.
The highest cop additionally toured that very same station the place a 17-year-old was hunted down and stabbed over the weekend earlier than hopping on the prepare for the transient journey with NYPD Chief of Transit Jason Wilcox.
“We now have had a difficult few weeks, however we're repeatedly doing prepare protection, we’re rising the strains the place we’re going to see extra officers,” she advised WABC.
On Wednesday, the NYPD tweeted about Sewell’s uncommon public look, saying, “Final evening, @NYPDPC & @NYPDTransit Chief Wilcox have been on the subway, checking in with straphangers.
“With a transparent message, they need individuals to know and really feel they're secure within the transit system.”
In January, Mayor Eric Adams and the NYPD celebrated the beginning of their “subway security plan” – an initiative that seeks to scale back violent crime underground by cracking down on high quality of life offenses and getting homeless individuals indoors.
For the reason that program’s inception, which incorporates flooding the system with 1,000 further cops a day, officers have gone on greater than 270,000 prepare runs and inspected stations greater than 750,000 occasions. However 10 months in, there’s little to indicate from the efforts.
General, main crime on the subways is up 42% to this point this yr in comparison with the identical time interval in 2021 and there’s already been seven murders, a close to 17% enhance that already reached a 25-year excessive the yr earlier than, knowledge present.
Whereas crime underground is 5% decrease to this point this yr in comparison with 2019, straphangers are 53% extra prone to be the sufferer of a felony crime as of late than they have been previous to the pandemic when decrease ridership numbers are taken into consideration, NYPD and MTA knowledge reveals.
To combat again in opposition to an issue NYPD brass insist is extra notion than actuality, Sewell has partnered with the MTA to document two security bulletins that’ll be performed at 400 stations via the top of October so commuters can at the very least “really feel” secure whereas they’re driving the rails, she has stated.
“Hey, I’m NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell. We now have elevated officers on trains and platforms as a way to journey safely, figuring out that we're right here to assist,” one of many bulletins states.
“In the event you see one thing, say one thing.”
Straphangers who depend on the subway system to get round every day scoffed on the security bulletins and stated Sewell’s one-stop stunt doesn’t doesn’t come near the fact of each day commuting.
“It’s bulls–t. One cease? I take the trains all day lengthy. The possibilities of me being damage are nice as a result of I take them,” Denise Decurtis, a nurse and lifelong New Yorker railed to The Submit Wednesday as she waited for the uptown A prepare at Columbus Circle.
“She must journey all day … Inform her to go to the West 4th Avenue station. That’s the worst.”
Roxanne Reid, a 30-year-old cashier who lives in Cypress Hills, laughed when she heard concerning the tour.
“I don’t suppose it’s lengthy sufficient to get the expertise we get every day,” Reid stated on the Instances Sq. A, C, E platform, including she solely just lately began taking the subway once more.
“I don’t really feel secure like I used to. Earlier than I used to be on my cellphone and now I’m not … It’s an absence of belief for humanity at this level.”
Kim Ramirez, an workplace cleaner who lives in Harlem, stated she just lately began touring with Mace after a person adopted her on the Bedford Avenue L prepare station in Brooklyn three months in the past.
“She needs us New Yorkers to say we received her again. No, she gotta do extra,” Ramirez stated of the security bulletins.
“Each second I’m turning round … I’m a mom. I don’t need to die at age 36. It’s very scary.”
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