Crime in Harlem

Harlem, a large neighborhood within the northern section of the New York City borough of Manhattan, is known as one of the worst areas for poverty and crime in New York City and the United States. Violence, especially in East Harlem, has worsened since the 1980s with crack cocaine and other drug addictions. As of 1995^[update], the leading cause of death among black males in Harlem was homicide. According to a survey published in 2013 by Union Settlement Association, residents of East Harlem perceive crime as their biggest single concern; at the same time, the police department's statistics show an increase in crime by 17 percent over the previous year.

Crime in Harlem is mainly related to petty theft, murder, drugs and prostitution.

Harlem was seen as sophisticated in the later part of the nineteenth century. Over the years, however, organized crime by gangsters of Italian, Jewish, and Irish origin, such as colorful personalities as Lucky Luciano, began to rise in Harlem. This gradually built its notorious reputation.

Since the 1920s, Harlem has been known as a major African-American residential, cultural and business center. Black residents began to arrive en masse in 1905, with numbers fed by the Great Migration. In the 1920s and 1930s, Central and West Harlem were the focus of the "Harlem Renaissance", an outpouring of artistic work without precedent in the American black community and it even came to be known as "the capital of black America." However, with job losses in the time of the Great Depression and the deindustrialization of New York City after World War II, rates of crime and poverty increased significantly.

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