Last month, we wrote about 22 burglaries at North Raleigh homes -- later upped to 31 -- that police say may be related. (See today's Police Report on page 11N for an update.)

And another N&O story last week told of six robberies of restaurants, two in North Raleigh, by a pair of robbers.

What's going on here?

Jim Sughrue, the sure-footed spokesman for the Raleigh Police Department, gave me some perspective on this seeming explosion of crime.

Yes, it is rising. In fact, property and violent crimes in the three police districts in North Raleigh already have surpassed totals for all of 2005. The 5,007 property crimes to date top the 4,877 for all of last year, and the 671 violent crimes are more than the 566 for all of 2005.

The steadily falling crime rates the city saw after instituting new crime-fighting techniques a few years ago reversed direction last year.

Sughrue attributed the rise largely to growth. With more people, he said, "there's more opportunity." He didn't have numbers readily available, but he said the crime rate has risen more slowly -- or perhaps not at all -- on a per capita basis.

And, Sughrue added, North Raleigh is still among the safer parts of the city. "They have half of the population but a third of the crime," he said.

Still, one wonders if the nature of the crimes is getting worse. Gun-toting robbers, brazen burglars -- this is suburban living?

There always have been crime sprees, Sughrue said. What's different is that police are more likely to recognize patterns because of technological advances in crime-fighting techniques.

In 2003, the Raleigh Police Department made much-hyped changes that included decentralizing the department into districts and using such techniques as computerized crime maps to more quickly spot trends.

Sughrue's perspective puts the crimes in a somewhat different light. But there's a human dimension to every crime that goes beyond the numbers. We're going to bring you more of that as we follow these stories.