New York City ended the year with a few more homicides than in 2002 -- but with fewer than 600, a number seen by police and city officials as a benchmark of a less violent era. The last time a year's total dropped below that number was 1963.
The final tally for last year was 596 homicides, up from 587 in 2002, according to official statistics released on Thursday. But police officials pointed out that those numbers could change as pending investigations were closed.
In the decades since 1963, the murder rate in New York City climbed dramatically and steadily, driven in the end by the crack cocaine epidemic and hitting more than 2,000 in the early 1990s. The 600 figure is therefore viewed as psychologically and symbolically important.
Even after huge drops in the mid- and late-1990s, the overall crime rate has continued to drop under Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his police commissioner, Raymond Kelly, who was also commissioner as crime began to slide off its highs in 1992.
The figure seemed in peril early in the week, with seven homicides occurring on Monday and Tuesday. But on Wednesday, New Year's Eve, the only reported homicide was a statistical addition to police numbers from a shooting that took place in 1991, the police said.
As New York officials announced the city's final number, their counterparts around the nation engaged in the same grim New Year's Day tradition. Chicago, with 599 killings, registered its lowest number in 36 years -- and 49 fewer than in 2002.
But that still left the nation's third-largest city with the largest number of killings last year.
Los Angeles, which had the most murders in 2002 -- 658 -- ended up with a total estimated at lower than 500, according to The Associated Press. The Los Angeles police commissioner, William Bratton, was New York City's commissioner in the mid-1990s.
Washington registered a small drop in the number of killings -- 247 from 262 in 2002 -- while Baltimore saw its first increase since 1998, to 271 from 253, according to The Associated Press.
With the slate wiped clean by the dropping of the ball, New York City recorded its first killing of 2004 less than an hour into the new year.
Two more quickly followed.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg seemed relieved that the city had fewer than 600 killings last year. But he was also quick to lament the incidents that occurred just after midnight.
"New Year's Eve is unfortunately one of those evenings where, for some reason or another, some people get a little bit crazy," he said. "Two is two too many, but it's a lot less than it used to be on New Year's Eve," he said.
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