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NYPD rolls out new unit in latest attempt to combat surging domestic violence
By
Charles Lane
Published Oct 16, 2025
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Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images
By
Charles Lane
Published Oct 16, 2025
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Domestic violence complaints in New York City have spiked 18% over the past five years according to NYPD data obtained by Gothamist and city officials are unable to point to specific drivers of the surge.
Mayor Eric Adams and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch announced Thursday the creation of a new dedicated domestic violence unit in response to the rising numbers, with approximately 450 investigators spread through every precinct in the city and focused exclusively on the crime.
But even before the new assignments, police were already making more arrests than in the past with little success tamping down a surge that has vexed city officials both within and outside of the NYPD.
The department received 103,762 domestic violence complaints in 2024, up from 88,182 in 2019. There’s an even sharper increase in police responding to incidents where there have been previous complaints. In 2024, 32% of all domestic violence complaints involved perpetrators with more than one complaint, up from 20% in 2019, according to NYPD data.
“This new unit now gives DV cases the same focused attention as gun violence or hate crimes,” Tisch said during a press conference Thursday. “There should be no scenario in which the NYPD has a computer crime squad in the detective bureau, but not a domestic violence squad in the detective bureau.”
But neither police nor city officials offered theories as to why incidents of domestic violence have steadily increased in New York and nationally, even as other post-pandemic crime has begun returning to pre-pandemic levels.
And the reshuffling announced Thursday represents just that latest attempt by the city to grapple with a growing problem that experts and officials are struggling to explain.
According to NYPD data, police have been responding to roughly the same number of domestic incidents, but formal complaints and arrests have surged — jumping 25% between 2019 and 2024 — or 48,537 arrests to 60,684 last year.
Jacquelyn Campbell, a professor who studies domestic violence at Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, said domestic violence has been increasing nationally since the pandemic. And, she points out, a spike in arrests has not led to a decrease in incidents.
"An arrest by itself, unless the perpetrator gets into some sort of intervention — an arrest by itself does not stop the abuse," Campbell said. "The underlying causes are still there."
The new NYPD domestic violence unit will streamline investigations by having dedicated officers handle cases from beginning to end, rather than the current system where multiple officers from different divisions work on the same case — something Tisch said would hopefully ease the reporting process for survivors.
“You would re-traumatize survivors by having multiple different members of the department, interviewing them, asking them the same questions, filling out a lot of the same paperwork,” Tisch said at Thursday’s announcement.
Tisch said communication training already given to sex crimes detectives will now be given to the new domestic violence investigators as well. The NYPD is creating two new civilian positions to enhance training given to all officers and coordinate with domestic violence prosecutions. The NYPD will also create “DOM Stat,” which will replicate Compstat, the statistically driven accountability program credited for driving down crime in the 1990s.
Earlier this year the city created an education program aimed at young adults from 13 to 21, according to Saloni Sethi, commissioner for the Mayor's Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence.
In an interview prior to Thursday’s announcement, Sethi said the education programs were given to about 400 people in an attempt to change behavior early. Still, she said, officials are looking for more ways to combat the rise of domestic violence.
"Yes, calling in the complaints, the arrests — that is one tool. But I think what this tells us is that this tool is not doing enough on its own,” she said. “We haven't necessarily seen a meaningful decrease in the number of domestic incidents in the past five years."
When asked about why domestic violence complaints have increased, police officials referred questions to Maureen Curtis, who leads the domestic violence prevention group Safe Horizons. She blamed society's apathy toward the issue.
"If we start saying that this is not okay, where [we’re] standing up and really taking a stand, I think we'll see a real difference," she said. "But until that time, I don't really think that we are gonna see a difference."
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new york city
public safety
Charles Lane
Charles is a Day-of reporter focused on breaking news and enterprise. He’s very friendly and can be reached at [email protected], or more securely on whatsapp/signal 631-295-6715
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