Hampton, NH — Accusing Mitt Romney of “trying to distract attention” away from his “very poor record” in dealing with crime, Rudy Giuliani shot back at criticism leveled at him today by the former Massachusetts Governor.

“I think that Governor Romney is trying to distract attention from what is clearly a mistake that he made. But you know the big mistake that he made was crime went up. Violent crime and murder went up while he was governor. And I think that is something that talks about not just an isolated mistake, that talks about a series of mistakes,” Giuliani said following a town hall meeting in New Hampshire Sunday.

The latest scuffle began with Giuliani questioning Romney’s judgment in appointing a judge who decided to later release a paroled murderer without bail–who went on to kill again. The former New York City mayor made the remarks to the AP Saturday. Romney responded in kind today, saying he was surprised to hear Giuliani question his judgment, given that Giuliani’s decision-making has already come into question over his closeness to indicted former NY police commissioner Bernie Kerik, whom he recommended for federal office.

Giuliani says that despite the fact that Romney has now called on the judge to resign, the initial appointment speaks to a more general point about his record.

“This whole appointment of a judge goes to a much bigger point-that Governor Romney had a very poor record in dealing with murder and violent crime as governor and I think that’s not just an isolated situation…..it’s a long term problem.”

His attack on Romney comes one day after Giuliani unleashed on Fred Thompson for having “no record” to run on and with the backdrop of recent New Hampshire polls showing Hizzoner losing ground to Romney. He dipped to third place  in the latest CNN/WMUR state poll, with 16 percent of the vote, compared with 33 percent for Romney. A September WMUR poll had Giuliani and Romney in a statistical tie, garnering 24 and 25 percent respectively.

Earlier today, Romney let Giuliani have it, accusing him of desperation, hypocrisy and calling it “strange” and “ironic,” that Giuliani would go after his judgment.

“I must admit of all people who might attack someone on basis of an appointment, I thought he would be the last to do so. The contrast again is quite clear…he put somebody in place as commissioner who had a questionable past and then recommended to the president of the United States this person be made the Secretary of Homeland Security despite the fact he at this point was under investigation. This is an individual who has now plead guilty to a crime, who has been indicted for 16 different actions and the idea that Mayor Giuliani would be critical of me in a circumstance where I appointed a person with a law and order record and 17 years as a prosecutor is really a strange development.”

He then compared Giuliani with what he derided as Clinton-era ethics.

“The record of ethical conduct from, in this case Bernie Kerik, reminds us very of the administration that Hillary Clinton was part of in Washington,” he added.