New York City Police Commissioner Bill Bratton speaks at a Swearing-In ceremony form police officers with New York Mayor Bill de Blasio (L) at the Police Academy on October 8, 2015 in New York City. (AFP)
The New York police chief declared Thursday that the Big Apple was on course for unprecedented low crime - despite murder numbers rising in tandem with other major US cities.
"Guarantee it, by the end of this year we will have the best crime year in the history of the city," Bill Bratton told a news conference after a swearing-in ceremony of new officers.
The New York Police Department (NYPD) is adding 1,300 more police officers, the first of which were sworn in Thursday in what Bratton called the first expansion of the NYPD in 15 years.
"Going in to next year, my projection would be we will have a good year next year because we will have a lot more resources to work with along with an already low crime rate," added Bratton.
Bratton and the NYPD, which now has 34,500 uniformed personnel, have come under pressure to deal with a rise in murders.
"We certainly, in New York, as we've wrestled with homicides that are up by about eight percent, and shootings for a while were up double digits, which are now down in the city -- what's behind it?" Bratton asked.
"Each city, they're trying to find a commonality."
Up to the end of September, there had been 257 murders this year, compared with 240 up to the same period last year. Rape is also up.
But crime is down this year in several other categories in New York, including burglary, and the general trend in the last two decades has been of a sharp fall.