Central Park has seen a spike in robberies and assaults, making tourists and native New Yorkers nervous about the troubling mix of violent teenagers, mentally ill vagrants and illegal immigrants roaming the troubled green space.
Robberies are up 222% so far in 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, according to data from the New York Police Department.
The 29 cases this year have already surpassed the total reported in all of 2019, according to the data.
Violent assault cases doubled from five to 10, up 100% from seven for all of 2019, the data showed.
“I’ve started coming here later because if I come too early, unfortunately, I see a lot of mentally ill people screaming,” said Upper East Side resident Kirsten Edwards, who now waits until later to walk her dog because the early hours seem too dangerous.
“I can honestly say that I’ve never felt more unsafe in Central Park.”
Serious crimes across the parks have increased 49 percent, from 47 to 70. The data also shows that two rape cases have been reported in the park this year, compared to none at the same time last year.
In an incident reminiscent of the “runaways” of the 1980s on August 1, a gang of up to 20 people, some of whom may have been children as young as eight, surrounded 37-year-old software developer Julien de Flandres as he sat on a bench near the Wollman Ring and robbed him.
Other recent robberies and assaults include::
- According to police, on July 8, a 21-year-old man was sitting on a park bench at the intersection of West 59th Street and Center Drive when he was robbed by an unknown man who took his cellphone and $80 and demanded that he “enter his password.”
- On May 23rd at around 3:00 p.m., an 83-year-old man was taking photos in a park at 94 West Drive when a thief stole his camera and fled.
- Ashiqul Chowdhury, 25, made the front page of The Washington Post on April 26 when he was walking through a park on his way to his Harlem home when he was attacked by two teenagers, one of whom was carrying a gun, who threatened to shoot him for stealing his cellphone. The teenagers then fled.
- A 42-year-old man was taking photos at the intersection of East 59th Street and East Drive around 6:10 a.m. on April 26 when he was robbed and assaulted at gunpoint while taking photos inside the park.
- According to authorities, on April 25, a woman was sexually assaulted by a pervert who grabbed her and demanded her “your phone, your wallet and let me have sex with you.”
Rising crime is upending daily life that has continued for decades.
“I stayed close to the road. [where] “Other people can hear me, and it’s a shame because I don’t want to have to worry about my safety,” said Allison Cambridge, 45, an opera singer from the Upper West Side who has been running in the park for nearly 30 years.
Cambridge said she avoids dark, deserted streets.
“I’m always looking back,” she added. “If I’m running and I have earphones in, I see a shadow and I jump. It’s the worst.”
Part of the problem stems from at least one nearby migrant shelter, the 57-year-old woman said: the 600-room Watson Hotel on West 57th Street, which is being converted into a migrant shelter in November 2022. That area, the NYPD’s Midtown North Precinct, has seen a 96% increase in robberies and a 60% increase in felony assaults, according to city data.
“Our neighborhood is right off West 57th Street, which is getting worse,” she said, “so it’s not surprising that crime is going up here, too.”
A 61-year-old investment banker who gave his name as John said he has used the park for 10 years and has noticed an increased police presence recently, with NYPD vans parked nearby and huge lights shining on the Great Lawn at night.
“A police officer recently told my wife, ‘Don’t go to the park alone,'” he said. “I never let my wife go to the park alone at night, but I was told she should be with someone during the day. It’s creepy. It’s unsettling.”
Visitors said the experience of visiting the park has also changed.
“Heads are always spinning here. You have to protect yourself,” said the actor, who lives on the Upper West Side, and declined to give his name for fear of retaliation for his opinions. “I think we really need to stop a lot of the really awful progressive laws that are in place right now.”
SoHo nanny Alexa Macucci sought therapy after she was sexually assaulted by a stranger in broad daylight in the Strawberry Fields area of Central Park.
Makuchi, 25, was on a picnic with another friend on July 14 when a man approached her and took off his clothes in front of her.
Surprised, the two men took out their cell phones and recorded the man, shouting “You’re recording us!”, but the man pulled up his trousers and ran away.
“Central Park is really an oasis. That’s what it’s so great about. I feel like it’s been taken away a little bit since this happened,” Macucci added. “It’s sad.”
Tiger Ashtiani, a tourist from Los Angeles, doesn’t plan on returning to the park anytime soon.
“Honestly, I’m scared to go to Central Park. It’s sad, but when I went there, there were a lot of unkempt people, a lot of people sleeping in tents in some places, and I didn’t feel completely safe,” said Ashtiani, 24. “It feels like there are a lot of corners and hidden places where bad people could be hiding.
“I have nice jewelry and I don’t want it to be stolen. I come to New York to have a good time, not to have a scary time,” he added.
Connor Wright, who was visiting New York from Seattle this week, said the spike in crime at the landmark site was “horrifying and disturbing.”
“I didn’t know crime would happen here, I just thought it was a rough area and people had warned me about it,” Wright said. “I can’t believe this is happening in Central Park, where I thought it was safe.”
Eugene O’Donnell, a professor at John Jay College of Law, said crime in the popular park was “growing” and that any major incident could have a huge impact on the city’s tourism industry.
“If you’re mayor, this is something you should be most wary of,” O’Donnell said.
O’Donnell added that robberies and assaults are often under-reported nationwide, so the actual number of incidents in Central Park is probably higher.
“My guess is that right now people’s instinct is not to report crime,” he said.
O’Donnell, a former district attorney in Brooklyn and Queens, said left-wing criminal justice reforms such as bail reform have put more people on the streets who would have been in jail or under police surveillance five years ago.
“A lot of people who wouldn’t have been on the run 10 years ago for a variety of reasons are on the run right now, and we continue to pretend that it doesn’t impact public safety,” he said.
The NYPD said it had increased the number of officers across Central Park to combat current crime trends and that it “continues to explore innovative ways and new technologies,” such as adding drones and cameras.
“The safety and security of all New Yorkers, including those visiting Central Park, is a top priority for NYPD officers.” a spokesman said.
