Newly appointed Syracuse Chief of Police Joseph Cecile spoke to the Common Council public safety committee Monday April 25, 2022. N. Scott Trimble | strimble@syracuse.com

Syracuse, N.Y. -- Burglaries in Syracuse have spiked over the past year, particularly in the southeast portion of the city where Syracuse University and Le Moyne College are located.

Syracuse Police Chief Joe Cecile sounded an alarm about the increase during a briefing Thursday, warning that many are occurring while residents are home.

“The numbers are out of control right now,” Cecile said.

Cecile said burglaries in the city are up 48 percent from this time last year, 547 to 811. They have more than doubled in the area that police consider the southeast district (125 to 277), which includes the two colleges.

Over a five-year period, burglaries have increased 29 percent citywide and 42 percent in the southeast.

Cecile said that most of the burglaries appear to be crimes of opportunity, where burglars have taken advantage of inattention by victims. He preached a need for people to take reasonable precautions.

“Very few of these crimes have been someone smashing a window, or kicking in a door or even forcing open a locked door,” Cecile said. “They are going through open windows. They are going through, in some cases, unlocked doors. Victims have a responsibility here. They can take away these crimes if they take away the opportunity.”

Cecile said residents should make sure to lock their doors and windows, even during the summer. He encouraged residents and landlords to buy motion-sensing lights.

Cecile said the police department believes the spike of burglaries comes largely from a group of juveniles. He said some have been arrested multiple times and that, in many cases, burglars are grabbing car keys from inside homes and then stealing cars.

He said that the cases when burglaries take place in occupied houses are all being assigned detectives and that the police department has identified suspects in some of them.

“Numerous ones we have camera footage or other information where we feel like we know who the suspect is,” Cecile said. “We have made arrests. Numerous arrests.”

Cecile said the police department has put additional plain-clothes and uniformed officers on patrol, in areas and times, when burglaries have occurred. He said that the department has also worked with Syracuse and Le Moyne police departments to put out information to students and place information on the doors of homes near the two schools.

Cecile said crime is up almost across the board in Syracuse this year in categories that include rape, robbery, aggravated assault and larceny. The only crime that has dropped off from last year is homicide, which has decreased 24 percent from 17 homicides to 13.

Cecile said he wasn’t sure why homicides have decreased during a period of increased crime, saying it could be good fortune, the work of local hospitals or the efforts of police officers.

Contact Chris Carlson anytime: Email | Twitter | 315-382-7932

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