Rohnert Park Plagued by Property Theft Crimes, Safer When it Comes to Violence

Property crimes in Rohnert Park surpassed violent offenses in 2010, and police were paid $980,855.31 in overtime last year. That’s the gist of the report from Chief of Police Brian Masterson looking back at last year.

The crime report, released last week, breaks down trends over the past five years. Here’s what the city documented:

Rohnert Park Public Safety put away one person for murder last year; and that’s rare here according to the numbers. The only other homicide in the last five years was in 2007. Nine rapes were reported; that’s down from the last five years. There were 17 forcible rapes reported in 2006, 16 in 2007, 11 in 2008 and nine the past two consecutive years.

There were roughly the same amount of persons robbed over the last five years; there were 18 in 2006, 23 in 2007, 19 in 2008, 28 in 2009 and 11 last year.

The number of aggravated assault is perhaps the most disturbing. There were 134 reported last year, compared with 166 in 2009, 198 in 2008, 200 in 2007 and 171 in 2006.

But the total number of property crimes outweighed crimes against people. Last year there were 835 total crimes that were classified as either burglary, larceny or motor vehicle theft. A total of 54 cars were stolen in Rohnert Park last year, compared with 52 in 2009, 72 in 2008, 87 in 2007 and 67 in 2006.

In terms of violent crime, we don't have a lot in Rohnert Park, Masterson said. "But it's important ... we pay attention to these numbers so we can get ahead of any potential crime trends."

Masterson added that overall, Rohnert Park is "very safe" thanks to the hard work from public safety officers and because of community policing.