1999 Annual Report

Aggravated Assault

Aggravated Assault describes an unlawful attack by one person upon another for the purpose of inflicting severe or aggravated bodily injury. This type of assault is usually accompanied by the use of a weapon or by means likely to produce death or great bodily harm. Attempts are included since it is not necessary that injury result when a gun, knife, or other weapon is used which could and probably would result in serious personal injury if the crime were successfully completed.

Unlike murder, robbery, and other violent crime, assault is born in the heat of the moment. The offender’s motivation during an assault is rarely personal gain, and the offender often later regrets the incident. Perhaps the most preventable violent crime, many assaults in the making are probably curtailed through the careful use of control and restraint, or through the intervention of bystanders and police.

However, assault is a very serious crime because of the great risk of critical injury to the victim. Very often, blind luck or quick medical attention is all that separates an aggravated assault from a murder.

Between 1984 and 1989, assault registered about 350 incidents per year; in 1990, it suddenly jumped 41 percent to an unprecedented 614 reports. It peaked at 643 in 1993; since then, it has declined each year. 1999’s statistic is the lowest since 1987.

A good portion of these fluctuations can be attributed to the frequency of which the crime is reported to police, rather than the frequency of its actual occurrence. As domestic violence awareness has increased over the last decade, so has the willingness of domestic violence victims to report abuse to the police.

Despite advances made by domestic violence victim advocates in recent years, experts estimate that between 50 and 80 percent of domestic assaults are never reported to the police. Very likely, apathy, fear of police contact, embarrassment, and other factors also lead to underreporting of alcohol related fights, assaults between acquaintances, gang fights, and conflicts among the homeless. The result is that assault statistics based on police reports are probably not reliable enough for effective long-term policy decisions.

A chart and graph of aggravated assault classifications over the past two years appears below. This year, 30% were domestic in nature—a percentage consistent with past years. An analysis of domestic assaults and other crimes appears in the Domestic Crimes section of this report.

The second highest category was “unprovoked” assaults—that is, assaults between strangers that have no apparent cause or reason; for instance, someone “comes out of nowhere” and beats a victim walking down the street. This category total should be considered with care. Victims are often reluctant to divulge their relationship to their attacker, or to admit to their own participation in a fight. The decision to categorize an assault as “unprovoked” is made solely by examining the victim’s statements at the time of report.

“Unprovoked” aggravated assaults were most likely to take place between 9:00 p.m. and 3:00 a.m., on the street, in Central Square (16) or Harvard Square (16). Most of the victims reported that they were just walking down the street when attacked. However, other assaults were the result of insignificant verbal confrontations. Most incidents seemed to result from the rage of others and involved weapons such as fists and feet, knives, and guns.

Acquaintance assaults run the gamut from drinking buddies to classmates. Two types of acquaintance assaults—workplace assaults and landlord/neighbor assaults—are singled out as unique categorizations. The impetuses behind these acquaintance assaults are as varied as the locations and times at which they occur.

Retail/Patron assaults are a special kind of incident in which the patron of an establishment assaults a clerk or manager. These assaults are often linked to shoplifting; store employees attempting to detain a shoplifter are struck in the shoplifter’s escape or attempt to escape.

Another way to look at aggravated assaults is to classify the relationship between the offender and the victim. Many, but not all, of the assault categorizations are based on this relationship.) This list shows the relationship between the offender and the victim in 1999’s 348 aggravated assaults:

Relationship                    Total            %

Stranger or Unknown             143               41%

Misc. Aquaintance                  60               17%

Romantic Partner                   43               12%

Ex-Romantic Partner              17                5%

Spouse                                  16                5%

Parent/Child                           13                4%

Neighbor                                12                3%

Client/Patron                          11                3%

Roommate                               9                3%

Co-Worker/Employee               6                2%

Sibling                                     5                1%

Ex-Spouse                              4                1%

Schoolmate                             3                1%

Landlord/Tenant                       2                1%

Teacher/Coach                         2                1%

Other Family                            2                1%

Though it is rare to find assault “hot spots,” there were a few during 1999:

·     Juvenile/gang assaults became a concern in March when two separate gang related brawls occurred at the Cambridgeside Galleria on Saturday evenings, resulting in the arrests of nearly a dozen Boston youths.

·     Cambridge Common at night became a hot spot for homeless assaults, with six aggravated assaults reported between March and September. Nearby, the 1400 block of Mass. Ave. became the site of two serious throat slashings involving homeless people in the winter.

·     Two shootings were reported in Area 4 on September 3, 1999, the first at Columbia Park at 2:25 a.m., and the second on Pine Street at 11:05 p.m. The victim in the first case was treated at the hospital and was subsequently arrested for possession of crack cocaine. In the second incident, a police chase resulted in the arrest of three men between 21 and 24 years old, two from Cambridge, one from Somerville. No one was injured in the second case. Two weeks later, a shooting murder occurred in Central Square.

Four assaults involved immediate life-threatening injury to the victim:

·     On February 16 at 8:25 p.m., an argument erupted in the Store 24 in Harvard Square between two intoxicated homeless people. One of the men pulled a knife and slashed the other man’s throat, nearly killing him. The assailant, a 43-year-old man, was later arrested.

·     On March 3, at the same place, at 7:40 p.m., another homeless man’s throat was slashed by a 32-year-old Boston man who was arrested.

·     On May 14 at 10:00 p.m., an argument between acquaintances at 2440 Massachusetts Avenue exploded in gunfire. A 34-year-old man from North Cambridge was shot four times in the chest. The victim would not name his assailant at the time of report.

·     On June 8 at 10:40 p.m., a 17-year-old man was found curled up in the hallway of his Douglass Street apartment building with a bullet wound in his chest. The investigation into this crime was continuing at the time of this report.

In 36% of aggravated assaults, there was no injury to the victim. In 47% of cases, there was “mild” injury (e.g., a black eye, a bruise, a small cut); 9% showed “moderate” injury (e.g., several bruises, a large cut, a sprain or small broken bone); 6% “serious” injury (e.g., a broken bone, unconsciousness, severe bruising, a deep cut); and 1% “life-threatening” injury (e.g., a gunshot wound or stab wound in a vital area, any injury requiring immediate surgery). In 23% of cases, the victim required hospital care.

Simple assaults, unlike aggravated assaults, are not scored among the Part I Crimes. Simple assaults do not involve the use of a dangerous weapon and are not intended to cause—and do not cause—serious injury. Examples of simple assaults include a shove, a punch in the stomach, or a slap in the face.

502 simple assaults were reported in 1999, down 23% from 1998, but if lack of reporting is a problem for aggravated assaults, it is probably doubly so for simple assaults, since they do not by definition result in serious injury.

Simple assaults are similar in categorization to aggravated assault, though a larger percentage of them—42%—are domestic in nature.

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Last Updated: 03/28/00 11:17:01