NYC Homicides: Old Wounds, New Deaths

NEW YORK - One man was shot three times because he owed someone money for drugs. Another was shot during an argument at a dice game. A third was shot for reasons no one seems to remember - possibly because, like the others, it happened more than three decades ago.

Those assaults and 28 others from previous years all might have been forgotten except for a common twist that has frustrated a police department obsessed with crime statistics: All 31 victims died this year and therefore will figure into the city's homicide toll for 2006.

In each case, the medical examiner ruled that old wounds - typically caused by gunfire or stabbings - contributed to the victims' deaths.

New York Police Department officials say reclassified homicides, or "reclasses," are running at nearly double their normal rate this year - there were 17 at this time last year - an anomaly complicating the department's effort to keep bringing the homicide rate down.

New York City's homicide toll reached an all-time high of 2,245 in 1990 before plummeting over the past 15 years to levels not seen since the early 1960s. The city had 572 homicides in 2004, and 539 in 2005.

Through Nov. 12, there have been 499 homicides this year, an increase of 7 percent from the 467 killings during the same period in 2005. Officials say if reclassified homicides were running at a normal rate, that increase might be more like 3 percent to 4 percent, giving police a chance to see the year-end total dip below the 2005 tally. That now appears unlikely.

Police have been surprised not only by the unusually high number of reclassified homicides, but by their vintage: Six stem from incidents in the 1970s, four in the 1980s. On average, they date back 12 years.

"We have no real explanation for it," said NYPD spokesman Paul Browne.

Neither did Ellen Borakove, a spokeswoman for the city medical examiner's office. But she stressed that the rules for determining what is a homicide are unwavering.

"Whether it was yesterday or 30 years ago, if the death is caused by the actions of another, that's a homicide," Borakove said.

Often, a shooting can cause paralysis and other medical complications that worsen over time and lead to death. Minus the shooting, "that chain of events would not have occurred," Borakove said.

The reclassifications also mean that detectives must dust off the files from old crimes and reinvestigate them as homicides. The perpetrators, sometimes already in prison, can be charged with murder.