Homicidal Fantasies

The New York Times has completed an interesting analysis of all murders committed in New York City from 2003 through 2008. Article here. Database here.

The city averaged 54o murders per year for each of the years 2003-08, down from 2,262 murders per year in 1990. In other words the murder rate is down 75% from what it was less than 20 years ago. That's a pretty stunning transformation.

And here's one tidbit I though was especially interesting: "From 2003 to 2008, the number of women killed each year by strangers was in the single digits."

The crime-fear in American society, often hysterical in tone, centers around fantasies of stranger attack, especially stranger attacks on women. Yet in New York, our nation's largest city, home to 8 million inhabitants, fewer than 10 women are killed by strangers each year.