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Jersey City officials say there was a reduction in crime in many of the major categories in 2014.

(Journal file photo)

Jersey City has “seen a major reduction in crime” in 2014, according to statistics released by the city on New Year's Eve.

Shootings were down 17.5 percent and reported crimes were down in a number of categories, including aggravated assaults, armed robberies, and sexual assaults, city officials said.

Aggravated assaults were down 34 percent, armed robberies were down 23 percent, and sexual assaults were down 18 percent from the previous year.

There was a “slight uptick” in homicides in 2014, from 20 in 2013 to 23 in 2014, but city officials attributed that to in increase in domestic violence homicides, up from two in 2013 to five in 2014, and a case of arson.

“This year we saw major progress on shootings, homicides and arrests,” Jersey City Mayor Steve Fulop said. “Although we had a slight increase in the absolute numbers of homicides, the reality is that the city had five domestic dispute homicides which the public knows no police officer can prevent as they happen between people living in the same household.”

The number of shootings decreased from 91 in 2013 to 75 in 2014, as reported by the State Police’s Regional Operational and Intelligence Center, according to the release.

The release said that in its first full year, the Jersey City Police Department CeaseFire Unit made arrests in 40 percent of all non-fatal shootings, with arrests in 36 out of 90 open cases.

The murder of JCPD Detective Melvin Santiago in July was also referred to in the release.

“To accomplish this crime decline while also dealing with the tragic loss of Detective Santiago and the nationwide climate surrounding policing, speaks volumes about the professionalism and the abilities of the men and women of the Jersey City Police Department,” Jersey City Public Safety Director James Shea said.

This year the U.S. Department of Justice awarded Jersey City a $1.875 million COPS grant that will fund 15 new police officers. The administration hired 38 new officers in June, and a class of 60 officers is scheduled to enter the police academy in early 2015, according to the release.

City officials also touted the new “table of organization” implemented by the Fulop administration in 2014, the “first such organizational structure of its kind in 20 years.”

The table of organization “outlines the needs for the department, assigns new officers to street level units, increases training for new officers, and establishes a better chain of command and structure for the department,” officials said in a press release.

The administration’s work to increase the diversity of the JCPD was highlighted, including the minority recruitment office in the HUB on Martin Luther King Drive.