Wednesday 19 December 2012

Officials see fewer murders, crimes in Bogotá

Murders and "high impact" crimes were said to be continuing a downward trend in Bogotá, with a reported 29 per cent drop in homicides in November 2012 year-on-year, city officials declared on 13 December. There appeared to be 104 homicides in Bogotá in November 2012 - compared to 147 in November 211 - and this was the lowest figure in 10 years, the capital's police chief General Luis Eduardo Martínez Guzmán stated, while speaking at a presentation with the Bogotá Government Secretary or security chief Guillermo Asprilla Coronado. Martínez gave 1,143 as the number of homicides registered so far in 2012, 22 per cent below 1,460 homicides for either the same period in 2011 or all of 2011. Homicides registered for the first 13 days of December were reported to have dropped 59 per cent compared to same time in 2011, December being termed "historically" the most violent month. Asprilla said "we have the homicide phenomenon under control in Bogotá. Our objective is to take the figure to a single digit." Other figures given for the first third of December 2012 were: a 46-per-cent drop in car thefts compared to the same time in 2011, a 30-per-cent fall in personal thefts or muggings and a 47-per-cent drop in shop thefts. On 18 December the prosecutor-general's office ruled that Asprilla be dismissed from his post and banned from public office for 12 years after investigations indicated a conflict of his private interests and public duties, the broadcaster Caracol reported. As Bogotá Government Secretary Asprilla is in charge of security and justice policies among other duties and is effectively a deputy-mayor; he was the acting mayor in in June 2012 when Mayor Gustavo Petro fell ill. But apparently he remained to date an attorney to plaintiffs who have taken the municipality to court after the explosion of a trash heap in 1997; damages could be paid for that. He has said he did not hide his legal activities and withdrew from the case after entering the city council, El Tiempo reported. Asprilla was reportedly to continue working while appealing the ruling.

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