Contrary to public opinion, crime is going down, according to the Police.

It's there for all to see in the numbers.

The total number of crimes reported to the Police in 2004 fell 14 percent compared to 2003, when crime fell 12 percent compared to 2003. The trend appeared to accelerate in the last three months of 2004, when the number of crimes reported was the lowest since 1997.

All of this is very good news, especially when the the fact that all crimes except violent crime have recorded a decline.

So it is fair to give the Police some credit for the lower crime rate given that they are the first to be blamed when the crime rate goes up.

Commissioner of Police Jonathan Smith rightly added a note of caution to the statistics when he released them yesterday.

Breaking and entering crimes can vary dramatically from one quarter to the next, and it only take one habitual burglar to wreak havoc both in particular neighbourhoods and with the crime statistics.

But Mr. Smith also noted that where the Police have seen a spike in break-ins they have been able to successfully target a particular area and put a stop to it. It is good to see that this kind of policing, which depends heavily on hi-tech analysis, is working. It is precisely the kind of targeted policing that has been so successful in New York City and elsewhere.

But Mr. Smith warned: "There is no room for complacency however, it is difficult if not impossible to project with any degree of certainty how long these declines in property crime in particular, will be sustained.

"Prior offenders will eventually emerge from the corrections environment and unless their addictive tendencies have been satisfactorily addressed then the risk of re-offending remains high."

Mr. Smith is right. Unless ? and there are no guarantees on this ? the corrections system can come up with a foolproof way to rehabilitate offenders, then it is likely that there will be another spike in break-ins in the future when a burglar is released.

Nonetheless, the downward trend is encouraging.

What is not is violent crime, which is bucking the rest of the crime trend and continuing to rise.

This helps to explain the public perception that crime is rising even when the statistics say otherwise.

One murder or one Wellington Oval-type incident will affect people's perceptions far more than a long-term decline in break-ins or a reduction in bike thefts.

Mr. Smith has been steadily moving away from the Police's previous insistence that Bermuda does not have a gang problem.

Indeed, he was at his most candid when he said: "Overall, the violent crime figures are above the figures we have experienced during the last three years. Much if not all of this can be attributed to ongoing gang related violence and rivalries where we've seen organised raids by gangs into rival neighbourhoods."

Mr. Smith said the Police's serious crime unit has led many of the investigations into these incidents, and rightly so.

But now that the problem has been diagnosed, it is time the Police established a dedicated gang unit, which could monitor gangs and gather intelligence on their leaders, structures and follow when and how violent outbreaks are likely to occur.

This is not so different to the targeting and crime intelligence that is already being carried out for burglaries and vehicle thefts. At the same time, the kind of "broken window" policies carried out so successfully in the US need to be applied in Bermuda too.

If a known gang member litters, he needs to be ticketed. If he uses offensive words, he needs to be charged. The Police need to maintain a presence in known gang areas to keep them moving until they have nowhere to go.

Some people will say that this is harassment. They would be right. When the alternative is a continued rise in Wellington Oval-type incidents, what's wrong with that?

It is not the whole solution. Much more needs to be done to understand why gang members, who are largely young black males, feel alienated from mainstream society and how to turn then around. But that is not the job of the Police alone.

That requires a community effort, which is long overdue. In the meantime, the Police need to do their jobs.