Crime Remains on Downward Trend as St. Louis Sees Fewest Homicides Since 2013

Crime remains on a downward trend in the City of St. Louis under Mayor Tishaura O. Jones’ leadership, with 150 homicides in 2024, the lowest number of homicides in 11 years. Overall, crime was down 15% year-over-year.

“While we have seen remarkable progress, 150 homicides in one year are still far too many, and we are committed to using every tool available to us to bring that number down much further,” said Mayor Tishaura O. Jones. “Our all-hands-on-deck approach, including close coordination with SLMPD, the Circuit Attorney’s Office, and our community partners, remains effective at continuing this downward trend.”

Contributing to this progress is Chief Robert Tracy, who was appointed by Mayor Jones in 2022 as the first SLMPD chief from outside the department and has spearheaded a modern, data-driven approach to crime fighting. In 2024, SLMPD revamped its website, making it more user-friendly, while making the weekly CompStat report easily accessible to the public. SLMPD also launched its crime-mapping tool, allowing for more transparency and public insight into crime fighting. Recruitment and retention have also been a focus for Chief Tracy, with 71 new recruits joining the force in 2024, and two dozen officers returning to SLMPD from other jurisdictions during his tenure.

"The men and women of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department are dedicated to seeing our positive progress continue into 2025," said Chief Robert Tracy. "We are absolutely committed to the safety of all St. Louisans and working closely with the entire criminal justice system to hold individuals accountable.”

In 2024, we were reminded once again of just how thankful we are for our officers, who risk their safety to serve our community. Officer David Lee, an 18-year veteran of the SLMPD, was killed in the line of duty on September 22. He will never be forgotten.

With Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore in office for his first full year in 2024, the SLMPD once again has a reliable partner in the prosecutor’s office who will ensure that criminals are held accountable.

"Working alongside the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department and the Office of Violence Prevention, we continue to create a higher level of public safety for the St. Louis community," said Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore. "We are focused on effectively prosecuting violent criminals, building trust through community engagement, and providing alternatives to incarceration where diversion is appropriate.”

The City is also addressing the root causes of crime. Through the Office of Violence Prevention (OVP), established by Mayor Jones in July 2022, the City of St. Louis is reaching at-risk populations with credible messengers, offering guidance and mentoring, and building bridges to education, training, and employment. The neighborhoods targeted by OVP saw a 52% decrease in murders and nonnegligent manslaughter from 2023 to 2024, outperforming the rest of the city.

Improving traffic safety continues to be a high priority, as well. While we have new tools coming this year in the form of automated cameras to help us enforce red light and speeding laws, the SLMPD was heavily present on our streets this past year. Officers issued a total of 27,002 traffic tickets, with 1,972 tickets for red light violations and 3,623 for speeding. Improving safety on our streets will remain a high priority, both through enforcement and improved infrastructure designs currently being planned and implemented, including the camping of more than 30 miles of arterial streets such as Kingshighway. In partnership with the Missouri State Highway Patrol, SLMPD doubled the number of joint operations in the City to enforce traffic laws. Traffic Safety completed 13 coordinated operations with Highway Patrol on area interstates compared to 6 in 2023.

As well, the City continues to see improvement in 911 response times, with current projections well on their way to reaching the national goal of answering 90% of calls within the first 10 seconds. By implementing best practices and improving salaries for dispatchers, we have improved that percentage from about 50% in April of 2023 to over 75% on average so far. Earlier this year, the Jones administration broke ground on a new, modern 911 Dispatch Center to bring all dispatchers under one roof in 2026 and further improve attraction and retention, helping us reach our goal and ensuring all St. Louisans get the fast response they deserve when calling 911.

New response mechanisms have also improved the way we respond to emergencies. In 2024, our dispatchers diverted 1,311 calls to our behavioral health response. 2024 also marked further development of our clinician-only response for the city, improving our efforts to ensure the right responder gets to the right call. This is a positive step, because not all emergencies need a response from an officer. When a behavioral health expert is better suited to help a resident, that’s who the resident should be connected to.