South Bend Police Department discusses community crime statistics

SOUTH BEND, Ind. - South Bend Police Department hosted their Community Crime Stat meeting tonight, showing despite high-profile homicides in recent weeks, there's some promising signs for South Bend Police. 

At SBPD's Community Crime Stat meeting, officials discussed three homicides in October and a significant spike in calls for shots fired. 

During the discussion, the crime data varied from last month's data seeing an increase in aggravated assaults and reports of shots fired, a decrease in drug related violence and property burglaries and a leveled result in robbery off a person.

Here were some of the crime statistics discussed: 

• Drug violence went down across the city from 46 to 37.
• Burglaries to residentials went down from 29 to 24. The east region was the only region that saw an increase, going from 6 to 7. The west saw the greatest drop, going from 12 to 7.
• Robberies to person stayed the same at 7 with the west region going up from 2 to 4. The east went down from 1 to zero and the south went from 4 to 3.
• Aggravated assaults went up from 13 in September to 16 in October with the biggest increase happening in the south region which rose from 3 to 8. 
• Reports of shots fired went up from 96 in September to 125 in October. All regions went up across the board. The south region had the highest uptake going from 30 to 43 with the west a close second going from 54 to 66.

Despite recent shootings, gun violence has decreased and is trending downwards compared to a 2022/2023 snapshot. 

"Having more officers on the street can turn into allocation of resources directly, instead of pulling from other departments to try to get those resources resolved," said Officer Joseph Cole. 

Crime tips can always be submitted anonymously to Michiana Crime Stoppers at 574-288-stop.