Newton Hate-Related 'Incidents' Increased In 2020

NEWTON, MA —During the pandemic Newton police saw an increase in car thefts, car break ins and in the number of hate-related incidents reported, according to the Newton Police Department's annual report released this week.

Crime fell in almost all other categories, and police arrested fewer people, according to the police. Crime in general is low in the city, which was listed as the third safest city in the United States for families in 2020 and the second safest in 2019 by safewise.com.

Hate crimes are defined as crimes motivated by bias, while hate "incidents" are bias related events that are not associated with a crime. The total of this combined category increased from 20 in 2019 to 30 in 2020.

In 2018, the number of reported hate-related crimes or incidents was 30, the year before that was 27 and in 2016 there were 25.

Last year the 30 total hate crimes and incidents included 26 bias incidents, up from 14 in 2019, three dubbed suspicious incidents, up from one the previous year, and one reported destruction of property up from none the year before. While there were four reported hate crimes in 2019, none of the incidents in 2020 rose to hate crime level, according to the report.

"The Newton Police Department’s Civil Rights Officer and the Community Service Bureau officers actively follow up on each and every one of these bias related crimes and incidents," Mayor Ruthanne Fuller said in a statement.

In February, Newton police investigated racist graffiti taped onto the sidewalk near the corner of Albemarle Road and Watertown Street, just as the school district was working to address use of the "N-word" at Newton North.

In the spring, high school classes at Newton South were Zoom-bombed with racist rants. Following that, several Newton City Council meetings were interrupted with racist rants there, too.

Then in July, a man drove into a crowd of young Black Lives Matter protesters at City Hall. Eventually he was found and police filed charges against him.

The number of violent crimes decreased from a total of 57 in 2019 to 44 in 2020. There were still four reported rapes, 32 reported aggravated assaults and eight reported robberies.

The total number of burglaries, which involve illegal entry, reported also declined by 32 percent, with residential burglaries going from 62 in 2019 to 39 in 2020 and commercial burglaries declining very slightly from 13 to 12.

Arrests went from 253 in 2019 to 199 in 2020.

Motor vehicle theft increased from 11 in 2019 to 15 in 2020. Newton saw a slight increase in car break-ins from 108 to 116, though the past decade shows a steady decline from 523 in 2010 and 150 in 2015 to the 116 in 2020.

The number of car crashes fell by 560, or 42 percent, from 1,322 in 2019 to 762 in 2020. According to police data, crashes involving a pedestrian declined from 34 in 2019 to 15 in 2020, and those involving a bicycle from 31 in 2019 to 23 in 2020. Operating under the influence incidents went from 50 in 2019 to 26 last year.

See the data here.