Editing Manhattan (section)

===Crime and public safety===
{{Main|Crime in New York City}}
Starting in the mid-19th century, the United States became a magnet for immigrants seeking to escape poverty in their home countries. After arriving in New York, many new arrivals ended up living in squalor in the [[slum]]s of the [[Five Points, Manhattan|Five Points]] neighborhood, an area between [[Broadway (Manhattan)|Broadway]] and the [[Bowery]], northeast of [[New York City Hall]]. By the 1820s, the area was home to many gambling dens and [[brothel]]s, and was known as a dangerous place to go. In 1842, [[Charles Dickens]] visited the area and was appalled at the horrendous living conditions he had seen.<ref>Christiano, Gregory. [http://urbanography.com/5_points/ "The Five Points"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140429161308/http://urbanography.com/5_points/ |date=April 29, 2014 }}, Urbanography. Accessed May 16, 2007.</ref> The predominantly Irish [[Five Points Gang]] was one of the country's first major [[organized crime]] entities.

As Italian immigration grew in the early 20th century many joined ethnic gangs, including [[Al Capone]], who got his start in crime with the Five Points Gang.<ref>[http://www.chicagohs.org/history/capone.html Al Capone] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140512025504/http://www.chicagohs.org/history/capone.html |date=May 12, 2014 }}, [[Chicago History Museum]]. Accessed May 16, 2007. "Capone was born on January 17, 1899, in Brooklyn, New York.... He became part of the notorious Five Points gang in Manhattan and worked in gangster Frankie Yale's Brooklyn dive, the Harvard Inn, as a bouncer and bartender."</ref> [[Sicilian Mafia|The Mafia]] (also known as ''Cosa Nostra'') first developed in the mid-19th century in [[Sicily]] and spread to the [[East Coast of the United States|US East Coast]] during the late 19th century following waves of Sicilian and Southern Italian emigration. [[Lucky Luciano]] established [[American Mafia|Cosa Nostra in Manhattan]], forming alliances with other criminal enterprises, including the [[Jewish mob]], led by [[Meyer Lansky]], the leading Jewish gangster of that period.<ref name=Smithsonian>Jaffe, Eric. [http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/talking-to-the-feds-151425207/ "Talking to the Feds: The chief of the FBI's organized crime unit on the history of La Cosa Nostra"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181129054307/https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/talking-to-the-feds-151425207/ |date=November 29, 2018 }}, ''[[Smithsonian (magazine)]]'', April 2007. Accessed November 20, 2016.</ref> From 1920 to 1933, [[Prohibition in the United States|Prohibition]] helped create a thriving [[black market]] in liquor, upon which the Mafia was quick to capitalize.<ref name=Smithsonian/>

New York City as a whole experienced a sharp increase in crime during the [[post-war]] period.<ref>Langan, Patrick A. and Durose, Matthew R. [https://s3.amazonaws.com/zanran_storage/www.istat.it/ContentPages/16185020.pdf "The Remarkable Drop in Crime in New York City"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303223256/https://s3.amazonaws.com/zanran_storage/www.istat.it/ContentPages/16185020.pdf |date=March 3, 2016 }} (PDF). [[United States Department of Justice]], October 21, 2004. Accessed June 4, 2014.</ref> The murder rate in Manhattan hit an all-time high of 42 murders per 100,000 residents in 1979.<ref name=Henshaw>{{cite web|author=Phil Henshaw |url=https://www.synapse9.com/cw/crimewave_nys2.htm |title=The Great Crime Wave |website=Synapse9.com |date=August 7, 2005 |access-date=February 26, 2022}}</ref> Manhattan retained the highest murder rate in the city until 1985 when it was surpassed by [[the Bronx]].<ref name=Henshaw/> Most serious violent crime has been historically concentrated in [[Upper Manhattan]] and the [[Lower East Side]], though robbery in particular was a major quality of life concern throughout the borough. Through the 1990s and 2000s, levels of violent crime in Manhattan plummeted to levels not seen since the 1950s,<ref>Southall, Ashley. [https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/27/nyregion/new-york-city-crime-2017.html "Crime in New York City Plunges to a Level Not Seen Since the 1950s"], ''[[The New York Times]]'', December 27, 2017. Accessed August 6, 2023. "It would have seemed unbelievable in 1990, when there were 2,245 killings in New York City, but as of Wednesday there have been just 286 in the city this year — the lowest since reliable records have been kept.... If the trend holds just a few more days, this year's homicide total will be under the city's previous low of 333 in 2014, and crime will have declined for 27 straight years, to levels that police officials have said are the lowest since the 1950s."</ref> with murders in Manhattan dropping from 503 in 1990, at the citywide peak, to 78 in 2022, a decline of 84%.<ref>[[Daniel Dale|Dale, Daniel]]. [https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/17/politics/fact-check-manhattan-crime-trump-bragg/index.html "Fact check: Here's the truth about crime in Manhattan"], ''[[CNN]]'', April 17, 2023. Accessed January 3, 2024. "New York City publishes crime statistics on its website, so the truth is easy to find. In 1990, when the city set its all-time record for total murders, there were 503 recorded murders in Manhattan, which is one of the city's five boroughs. In 2022, Manhattan recorded 78 murders – a decline of about 84% from 1990."</ref>

Today crime rates in most of [[Lower Manhattan]], Midtown, the [[Upper East Side]], and the [[Upper West Side]] are consistent with other major city centers in the United States. However, crime rates remain high in the Upper Manhattan neighborhoods of [[East Harlem]], [[Harlem]], Washington Heights, Inwood, and [[New York City Housing Authority]] developments across the borough, despite significant reductions. After the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, there had been an increase in violent crime, particularly in Upper Manhattan.<ref>Marcius, Chelsia Rose; and Shanhan, Ed. [https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/05/nyregion/new-york-crime-stats.html "Major Crimes Rose 22 Percent in New York City, Even as Shootings Fell"], ''[[The New York Times]]'', January 5, 2023. Accessed August 6, 2023. "The declines in murders and shootings last year appeared to be in line with similar drops in other U.S. cities, which, like New York, experienced a surge in such crimes in 2020 and 2021 amid the worst of the pandemic, criminal justice experts said.... Mr. Herrmann also noted that, based on his own analysis of Police Department data, the decline in shootings had yet to be felt in some neighborhoods long plagued by gun violence, including Brownsville and Bushwick in Brooklyn; Central Harlem and Inwood in Manhattan; and East Concourse and Claremont in the Bronx."</ref> Mirroring a nationwide trend, rates of shootings and violent crimes in 2023 declined from their peaks during the pandemic.<ref>Meko, Hurubie. [https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/06/nyregion/shootings-nyc-crime.html "Shootings in New York Drop by a Quarter as Surge of Violence Eases; Murders and rapes were also down, part of a nationwide trend after a post-pandemic spike."], ''[[The New York Times]]'', July 6, 2023. Accessed January 3, 2024. "Shootings in New York City dropped by about 25 percent through the first half of this year compared with the same period last year, extending a downward trend after a spike in violent crime during the pandemic. The sharp drop, which mirrored similar decreases across the United States, came amid widespread fears about crime in the city, which officials have blamed for keeping workers and suburbanites cloistered in their homes."</ref><ref>Marcello, Philip. [https://apnews.com/article/trump-bragg-new-york-manhattan-nypd-4c0cb6ef067b2e3f2358ec9542c900cd "FACT FOCUS: NYC crime is not worst ever, despite claims"], ''[[Associated Press]]'', April 18, 2023. Accessed January 3, 2024."</ref><ref>Marcello, Philip. [https://apnews.com/article/trump-bragg-new-york-manhattan-nypd-4c0cb6ef067b2e3f2358ec9542c900cd "FACT FOCUS: NYC crime is not worst ever, despite claims"], ''[[Associated Press]]'', April 18, 2023. Accessed January 3, 2024.""CLAIM: Crime in New York City is the worst it's ever been, especially in the borough of Manhattan where Trump faces criminal charges. THE FACTS: While it's true that major crimes in New York City rose last year compared to 2021, criminal justice experts say crime levels were significantly higher three decades ago, and that the current levels are more comparable to where New York was a decade ago, when people frequently lauded it as America's safest big city.... 'Virtually every major crime category is lower in Manhattan now than it was last year,' he wrote."</ref>