Ultra Music Festival 2015 wrapped up Sunday night with a surprise guest-laden performance from American bass don Skrillex that included Diddy, Kiesza, Diplo and Justin Bieber. By all accounts, the festival was a success and the police numbers that have been released appear to back that up. Arrests were down in 2015, compared to 2014, from 84 to 76 with a sharp decline in felonies down from 31 to 20 according to data from the Miami PD via the Miami New Times.
Organizers beefed up their security for this year, bringing in former Miami Beach police chief Ray Martinez as head of security and changed policy for the festival. They upped the age of attendees to 18, restricted items attendees could bring in and reinforced fences on the exterior after last year's fence-jumping fiasco that saw one security guard get trampled and sent to the hospital with serious injuries after attempting to stop the flow of people coming over.
Misdemeanors were up slightly form 52 to 56, but the majority of the infractions were minor like trespassing and vending without a license. This entails people selling food, water or merchandise around the festival grounds without permission from the festival.
"We've learned from years before what's worked and what hasn't, and so far what I can report is that we've had significantly less arrests than we had last year," said Miami Police Sgt. Freddie Cruz via WSVN 7 News. "The arrests that we have made have been for trespassing, vending without a license."
The majority of the felonies were molly possessions, but that was down 50 percent from 20 to 10, though robberies were up from 1 to 5. It appears that with all of the major cameos and "Ultra" moments, UMF did a good job to keep the festival safe and added security measures worked this year.
