New York City Mayor Eric Adams unveiled on Thursday, March 28, a plan to install new technologies designed to detect guns on the country’s most famous subway system.
The announcement was made as the mayor’s office released statistics saying police seized 450 weapons, including 19 illegal firearms, from people riding the subways over the first three months of 2024, Knewz.com has learned.
“Keeping New Yorkers safe on the subway and maintaining confidence in the system is key to ensuring that New York remains the safest big city in America,” said Mayor Adams in a press release. “Today’s announcement is the next step in our ongoing efforts to keep dangerous weapons out of our transit system and to provide greater mental health services for New Yorkers in crisis.”
The mayor also announced it would hire more clinicians to help people who may be having a mental health crisis while on the subway system.
The city will begin a 90-day waiting period to hear public feedback before it launches the gun detection program.
Details of the specific technology were not released, but a similar system installed in the Georgia Aquarium leverages artificial intelligence to create a hands-off approach in which the machine does not appear to operate unless it detects a firearm.
The announcement comes as the city launches a public security push on its subways, which involved deploying an additional 1,000 police officers daily throughout the subways.
A few high-profile cases have increased public worries that crime is rising in the city, although statistically that does not appear to be true.
In one recent incident, a man murdered someone by pushing them in front of a moving train.
Earlier this month, a man from Brooklyn was shot by his own gun after he provoked another man on the subway system. During an altercation, the defender managed to steal the aggressor’s gun and then shot the man in the head, who survived and was charged with crimes related to the attack.
During that altercation, a woman jumped the aggressor and stabbed him in the back, which was the incident that sparked him to pull out the gun. Police have not tracked down the woman, who was wearing a facemask.
Separately, a teenager fired a gun at a police officer in Times Square and missed, injuring a tourist.
However, statistics released by the mayor’s office suggest crime in the subway system has dropped as compared to the same time last year.
The office said subway crimes were down nearly 16% compared to March 2022, following a 15.4% drop year-on-year in February.
It said overall arrests were up 56%, including a 111% increase in arrests for gun violations. It also reported a 78% increase in fare evasion arrests.
“Riders have to feel safe when riding the subways, and that requires innovation – new weapons detection technology, but also increased deployments of police, tougher handling of repeat offenders by the criminal justice system, and expanded resources for mental health,” said Metropolitan Transportation Authority CEO Janno Leiber.
The post NYC to Introduce Gun Detectors in Subway System After Surge of Officers Recently Deployed appeared first on Knewz.
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Author: Kevin McSpadden
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