In one of America's deadliest cities, police have struggled to solve killings due to staffing shortages, shoddy detective work and lack of community trust.

Of the roughly 1,900 homicides committed in the city of St. Louis from 2014 through 2023, more than 1,000 remain unsolved, according to an analysis of homicide data obtained by APM Reports and St. Louis Public Radio.

During those years, murders in St. Louis surged, making the city one of the nation’s deadliest. For most of the decade, police struggled to bring perpetrators to justice. A review of 20 years of data and records reveals some of the reasons why police failed to solve so many homicides, including shoddy detective work, lack of resources and an erosion of community trust.

    • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zip
      102·
      5 months ago

      St. Louis is arguably the worst case of urban decay currently occuring in America, even worse than the much popularly maligned Detroit.

      Basically, there are whole districts of the city that are just literally falling apart. The city’s population has been shrinking, poverty is rampant as the economy tanks, public services are on the decline…

      Vice has a documentary on it.

      Edit: For comparison, heres St Louis crime statistics compared to by far the most dangerous city in Ecuador (currently only in Western news for their war against cartels).

      https://www.numbeo.com/crime/compare_cities.jsp?country1=United+States&country2=Ecuador&city1=Saint+Louis%2C+MO&city2=Guayaquil&tracking=getDispatchComparison

      As you can see, an international news worthy level of violence in Ecuador is just shy of an average day in St Louis.

      • nexas_XIII@lemm.ee
        7·
        5 months ago

        To add onto this, St. Louis is similar to Baltimore where the city and the county have split. The city isn’t like almost every other city in America. The city numbers don’t have the more suburban calmness and reduced crime to easily compare across other cities. The north of the city is definitely dangerous, but as I understand it every city has a more run down dangerous area.

        • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.zip
          1·
          5 months ago

          Well I’d love to use statista, but I am just barely not homeless and thus unable to afford a membership for a lemmy post.

          Numbeo is the best widescale city data comparison site I can find thats available for free and works on a shit tier phone with spotty 4g connection.

          If you can find more accurate numbers, please by all means present them and I’ll edit my post.

          • AProfessional@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            5 months ago

            Many cities release public crime stats. However standardized numbers are probably very hard to get.

            I look at my local one from time to time, and it’s pretty average. This site makes it sound like a war zone, and I believe that’s exactly what a survey would show. Since news is so negative and no average person would ever take a survey.