By Dan Murphy
District 4 saw a 7-percent drop in violent and property crime in 2017 from the previous year.
According to Boston Police, 3,627 incidents of Part One crime were reported between Jan. 1 and Dec. 31, 2017, in the district, which includes the Back Bay, South End, Lower Roxbury and the Fenway, as opposed to 3,866 during the same timeframe in 2016.
Two homicides were reported in 2017 as opposed to one the previous year, while rapes and attempted rapes saw an approximately 9-perecnt uptick, with the number of incidents climbing to 47 from 43 in 2016.
Robberies and attempted robberies were down more than 10 percent as the number of incidents dropped to 198 from 221 in 2016.
Domestic aggravated assaults also saw about a 10-percent decline, with 49 incidents in 2017 as opposed to 55 the previous year.
Non-domestic aggravated assaults were down around 5 percent as the number fell to 227 from 238 in 2016.
In contrast, commercial robberies spiked around 32 percent, climbing to 74 incidents in 2017 from 56 the previous year.
Residential burglaries, on the other hand, were down nearly 23 percent, with 144 incidents as opposed to 187 in 2016.
Other burglaries saw a 64-percent surge as the number of incidents rose to 23 in 2017 from 14 the previous year.
Larcenies from motor vehicles saw about an 11-precnt decline, dropping to 588 incidents from 661 the previous year.
Other robberies were also down nearly 6 percent as the number of incidents fell to 2,117 from 2,244 in 2016.
The rate of auto theft, on the other hand, was up more than 8 percent as the number of incidents climbed to 158 in 2017 from 146 the previous year.
Citywide, Part One crime was down around 7 percent, with 18,528 total incidents of violent and property crime in 2017 as opposed to 19,804 the previous year.