Prairie Village crime down in 2012 — but burglaries off to brisk start in 2013

So when it comes to burglaries in Prairie Village, there’s good news, and there’s bad news…

The Prairie Village Police Department’s final tally of crime statistics for 2012 show a marked drop in residential burglaries from 2011. Police logged 45 residential burglary reports in 2012, a 22 percent drop from the 58 recorded in 2011.

That’s the good news.

The bad news is that the department has already responded to 10 residential burglary reports in 2013. And we’re not even a month in.

Police Chief Wes Jordan told the Prairie Village City Council on Tuesday that officers were paying close attention to the issue, and hoped to quell it quickly.

“Sometimes these things spike without much rhyme or reason and then disappear just as quickly,” he said. “But we are taking these latest incidents very seriously.”

Of the ten completed or attempted residential burglaries in 2013, seven occurred west of Mission Road — a notable fact given that the bulk of burglaries that plagued the city between 2008 and 2011 were in the Ward 6 and Ward 3 neighborhoods that sit near State Line Road. The police launched a new patrol scheme in 2011 designed to heighten their presence in those areas.

With 6,386 calls in 2012, the total incident load was at its lowest level since 2008. In addition to reduced residential burglaries — which have trended down from a high of 68 in both 2010 and 2011, but are still above the 16 and 24 reported in 2006 and 2007, respectively — incidents of theft and criminal damage saw significant drops as well.

The city had no homicides, six rapes, three robberies and 68 assaults in 2012, according to the statistics.