Violent Crime

Jeffrey Nugent is the former president and chief executive of Revlon. I'm a member of the National Rifle Association and a former Army officer with assignments in the military police, artillery, and operations research and intelligence at the Pentagon. I'm also Ted Nugent's older brother. Ted and I recently attended the NRA convention in Houston, where he delivered the gathering's final speech and continued his ardent defense of the Second Amendment. Ted and I have hunted together for...

RICHMOND, Va. — State Police statistics show both violent and property crimes fell about 3 percent in Virginia in 2012 compared to the year before. The report released Monday showed there were 316 murders in the state last year, compared with 305 in 2011. State Police say drug and narcotics offenses rose 9.4 percent and increased for the third straight year. Crimes such as burglaries, larcenies and motor vehicle thefts fell 3.3 percent, while murder, rape, robbery and aggravated assaults dropped by 3...

Violent crime appears to have declined nationwide in 2007 for the first time in three years, with major cities showing the most significant drops, according to a preliminary FBI report released yesterday. Bureau officials said the number of violent crimes reported -- offenses including homicide, robbery and assault -- dipped by 1.4 percent across the United States last year compared with 2006. While cities with more than 1 million residents showed improvement, smaller urban communities including Baltimore and Atlanta apparently posted a rise in...

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — The Maryland Senate has voted to extend a state law that allows police to take DNA samples from arrestees for certain violent crimes. The Senate voted 39-7 to pass the bill on Thursday, sending it to Gov. Martin O'Malley who supports the law. The law, which took effect in 2009, was set to expire in December. The measure extends it indefinitely. The U.S. Supreme Court heard a case challenging the law earlier this year. The high court has yet to rule. ...

Homicides and overall violent crime are down in Prince George's County this year, despite an increase in rapes and carjackings, new statistics show. There have been 3,688 violent crimes reported this year, down 8 percent from this time last year, although rapes are up 20 percent and carjackings are up 9 percent. Among nonviolent crimes, 20,975 thefts, burglaries and stolen cars have been reported, a decrease of less than 1 percent compared with last year. To date, the county has recorded 75 homicides, compared with 81 a year ago. ...

The City of Manassas experienced an increase in traffic tickets and citations for driving under the influence, while violent crime declined in the past year, according to a report released Monday. Police Chief Douglas W. Keen presented the department's 2011 annual report to the City Council on Monday, where council members praised the chief and the department for stepping up enforcement and increasing community policing efforts in Manassas neighborhoods. Overall, arrests dropped 4 percent, according to the...

Crime in Loudoun County increased in most major categories last year, according to preliminary statistics, and a Loudoun County Sheriff's Office spokesman said population growth and the deepening recession were probably factors in the trend. The number of violent crimes was 27.5 percent higher than in 2007. Most of that increase was due to a sharp rise in aggravated assaults, from 92 in 2007 to 137 in 2008. The number of homicides went up from one to three, the number of rapes from 51 to 53, and the number of...

Back in the crack-infused 1980s, young men with guns and drugs ruled the single block of Hanover Place NW. People who lived in the two-story rowhouses one mile north of the Capitol fell asleep year round to the sounds of the Fourth of July, a pop-pop-pop that they hoped was firecrackers. It rarely was. But after two decades of consistent and dramatic declines in homicides and gun violence in Washington and many other major cities, Hanover Place is mostly quiet these...

Although homicides more than doubled in Charles County last year, the amount of crime overall stayed about the same from 2007 to 2008, according to data released last week by the sheriff's office. To combat the perception that crime is growing worse in Charles, especially in the Waldorf area, the sheriff's office released data showing drops in every type of violent crime except homicides from 2007 to last year. The number of homicides rose from four to 10. Those figures, which vary from data...

Violent crime in the District is down, echoing national trends, but rapes in the city increased by almost 25 percent in 2010, according to federal statistics released Monday. According to the FBI's annual report "Crime in the United States, " there were 187 rapes in the District in 2010, compared with 150 in 2009, a 25 percent increase. Nationally over the same period, rapes decreased by 5 percent, from 89,241 to 84,767. The local figures represent 2010 statistics that D.C....

I defy anyone not to be brought to tears by Christa Parravani's account of the aftermath of her twin sister Cara's rape and death [" My twin was raped. It almost killed me ," Outlook, March 31]. Those of us who have not been touched by violent crime in this way must extend our gratitude to those who share such stories, so that we may all be moved to strive for a more peaceful world. We must raise our children better. We must elevate the regard our society has for women and girls.

Back in the crack-infused 1980s, young men with guns and drugs ruled the single block of Hanover Place NW. People who lived in the two-story rowhouses one mile north of the Capitol fell asleep year round to the sounds of the Fourth of July, a pop-pop-pop that they hoped was firecrackers. It rarely was. But after two decades of consistent and dramatic declines in homicides and gun violence in Washington and many other major cities, Hanover Place is mostly quiet these days. Complaints to...

A former federal agent walking his dog in his quiet Woodbridge neighborhood was gunned down Wednesday evening in what authorities called a random robbery gone wrong. Police quickly arrested a suspect after a neighbor reported the sound of four gunshots. Officers said they do not think that Gregory Lee Holley's career at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had anything to do with the shooting, which occurred about 9:40 p.m. on Wertz Drive. They also said they do not think...

Coming up today in the D.C. region: Teen on trial: Jury selection is set to begin in the trial of the teenager accused of shooting a disabled classmate at Maryland's Perry Hall High School. Violent crime spree: Opening statements are expected in the trial of a Prince George's County man for the 2009 slayings of a mother and daughter. The man, Jason Scott, is already to 100 years in prison for other violent crimes. Dreary winter weather: It's a typical February day , as clouds this morning...

As pr osecutors, we have long noted with distress how often children are present when violent crimes are committed. Kids don't need to be the target of the violence to be scarred by it. Ask any adult who witnessed domestic violence while growing up; decades later, he or she will still be able to talk vividly of the event and how it affects them today. Researchers studying these "invisible victims" have found that an array of emotional and behavioral consequences flow from the exposure.

At least 11 defendants awaiting criminal trials in the District in the past year were charged with violent crimes after being released from jail through the court system's electronic monitoring program. According to statistics from the District's Pretrial Services Agency, of 1,351 defendants who were released with GPS ankle bracelets to track their movements, 110 were arrested and charged with new crimes. Nearly a dozen crimes were violent, including armed...

U.S. attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. , the District's top prosecutor, said he is temporarily leaving the city and returning to his Silver Spring home because the lease on his D.C. residence was not renewed. Machen, whose investigation of D.C. public officials has led to the resignations of two council members and guilty pleas from several people, including three associates of Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D), has said he has no plans to resign or to cede work. Federal law requires U.S. attorneys to...

The plan was to drive from the District to Arlington County and rob someone to recoup the money that the cousins had lost in a dice game that night, prosecutors said. Carl Diener — bespectacled, older and walking alone in the dark — might have seemed an easy mark. But the assailants did not anticipate Diener's strength, physical fitness or determination to defend himself, Molly Newton, chief deputy commonwealth's attorney, said during opening statements in the trial of one of the accused in Arlington Circuit Court.

Does anyone find irony in Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley's call to abolish the death penalty [" Md. governor to push bill to end state's death penalty ," Metro, Jan. 15] just one day after proposing new restrictions on gun ownership [" O'Malley to seek tougher gun laws ," front page, Jan. 14]? Consider these data points from the infographic " Virginia vs. Maryland " in The Post's Jan. 13 WP Magazine [" The great divide "]: In Virginia, there's one registered gun for every 36 people and 214 violent...