by Michelle Mullen

As shootings fall to historic lows across New York City, violent crimes among minors are not following the trend. Some violence-prevention workers say one of the most noticeable shifts is the weapons teens are turning to, as stabbings and cuttings become more common.

Across the city, violent felony arrests involving juveniles have climbed steadily in recent years. Among minors, the number of violent felony offenses committed jumped by 35 percent between 2018 and 2024,  according to the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice – an agency that advises the mayor on criminal justice policy and public safety initiatives. Juveniles made up 11 percent of all violent felony arrests in 2024.

Bronx Rises Against Gun Violence, known as BRAG, a program run by the nonprofit Good Shepherd Services, works in neighborhoods with high concentrations of shootings, connecting victims and at-risk young people with counseling, mentorship and other support services.

For years, much of BRAG’s violence prevention strategy centered on guns. But workers on the ground said they are seeing a different pattern, one driven increasingly by knives and other sharp weapons.

BRAG relies on data to identify the most crime-ridden areas, where outreach workers, such as senior vice president David Caba, attempt to intervene in conflicts before they escalate. 

“One of the things we tend to focus on are trends — how things are changing across geography, groups and age ranges,” he said. “What we’ve been seeing a lot more of lately in terms of violence is stabbings and cuttings, a lot of knives being used instead of guns.”

In December 2025, according to reports by CBS, police confiscated 1,700 weapons in New York City schools, with firearms making up a small percentage of what was seized.

“It’s so much easier to get a knife than a gun,” Caba said. “Knives are in your kitchen. And the big difference between knives and guns is that knives don’t run out of ammunition.”

Particularly of concern is the growing number of small weapons — like scalpels – being recovered in schools.

In January, PIX 11 reported 205 scalpels had been confiscated in schools since the start of the 2025-26 school year.

Still, Caba said, most altercations between youth involving a weapon are off of school grounds.

Last month, two teenagers were injured in a stabbing by another teen near Marie Curie High School on Sedgwick Avenue in Kingsbridge Heights. Police said officers responding to a 911 call at 2:49 p.m. Feb. 11 and found a 16-year-old with a slash wound to the neck and a 14-year-old with a stab wound to the abdomen.

Both were taken to St. Barnabas Hospital in stable condition.

“What people don’t know is that the majority of the time, the individuals that are carrying the weapon, it’s not because they are looking to hurt anyone, it’s because they’re trying to protect themselves,” Caba said.”If there’s a second-grader in school and there’s a gang trying to recruit you, and they’re being aggressive with you, even violent with you, you’re going to want to protect yourself.”

In the five boroughs, the New York Police Department has increasingly focused on safety in and around schools, reflecting the urgency of juvenile violence.

At the start of the 2025–26 school year, the agency implemented its School Safety Plan, an initiative designed to focus enforcement and prevention efforts on areas  students are most vulnerable. This includes commuter corridors, bus stops and routes young people travel to and from school.

Since the program launched in September, Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said youth-related crime in those zones has fallen 56.7 percent during deployment hours, dropping from 252 incidents to 109.

Despite that decline, Caba’s workload hasn’t slowed.

“Every night, we’re doing countless mediations, de-escalations and interruptions,” Caban said. “We’re already on the scene, already in those spaces, trying to stop violence before it happens.”

And while shootings may be falling, he said the changing nature of youth conflict means violence prevention efforts must evolve as well.

“You have to pay attention to the trends,” he said. “If the weapons change, if the ages change, if the locations change — the work has to change with it.”

BRAG concentrates on what Caba called the “highest-risk individuals” — young people already entangled in violence who may influence others in their peer groups.

Outreach workers, many of whom grew up in the same neighborhoods as the kids they support, rely on credibility and long-standing relationships to intervene. Their work often involves daily check-ins, mediating disputes between rival groups and helping young people find alternatives to street conflict.

The group continues to expand its prevention work in schools through programs like Safe Passages, a Department of Education initiative connecting at-risk minors with mentors and support services, and offers outreach workers to escort kids safely to and from school.

At the heart of the effort is a strategy focused on keeping students engaged in school and steering them away from violence.

“We see what it is that we can do to help them unlearn to resolve conflicts through violence so that it doesn’t have to get there,” Caba said.

Keywords

NYC youth violence trends,

knife violence among teens NYC,

Bronx youth violence prevention,

BRAG outreach program Bronx