Homicides Up 94 Percent In Los Angeles County

The title of this post is the headline of a story in the Police Tribune.  To say that the “leadership” of  DA George Gascón has been a disaster for the entire County, but especially for black people who are disproportionately victims of violent crime, hardly captures it.

Here’s how the article starts:

The homicide rate in Los Angeles County skyrocketed 94 percent in the past two years alone, according to the sheriff.

Grand theft auto offenses are also up 59 percent, Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva said during a press conference on Wednesday, according to KABC.

Sheriff Villanueva used data from 2019, 2020, and 2021 to illustrate the rising trend….

[He] said the massive jump in homicides is “probably one of the biggest jumps ever” anywhere in the nation.

The number of aggravated assaults has also increased nearly 12 percent over the past two years, according to the Los Angeles Daily News.

The sheriff said many factors have contributed to the crime spikes, including the hiring freeze the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors placed on his office, KABC reported.

Gosh, maybe it’s not such a neat idea after all to freeze, reduce or defund the police.

The sheriff said he is hoping to fill at least 800 sworn positions at the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department (LASD) this year, which would bump up the number of deputies from 9,500 to at about 10,300, KABC reported.

Los Angeles District Attorney George Gascon’s soft-on-crime criminal justice reform policies have also contributed to the massive jump in violent crime, Sheriff Villanueva said.

Gascon’s office sidestepped that accusation entirely in a statement released after the press conference, KABC reported.

His office instead focused on Gascon’s “top priority” of “police accountability.”

“He is working to restore the public’s faith in the criminal legal system by holding law enforcement officers who violate the law accountable for their crimes,” Gascon’s office declared.

Now some might think that an explosion of murder would be the District Attorney’s top priority, but what the heck.  For however that may be, nowhere does Mr. Gascon mention his own accountability, there apparently being none.

So here we are.  Murder nearly doubles in just two years of Gascon’s watch, and he had nothing to do with it.  This is what they want you to believe.  And you will believe it, too, if you have the IQ of a carrot.

Of course the actual evidence of the supposed citizen distrust of police is a different story:

Despite the uptick in violent crime, the number of complaints on deputies has decreased by 43 percent over the past year at LASD stations where bodycams have been implemented, KABC reported.

Sheriff Villanueva said he will continue expanding use of bodycams throughout the sheriff’s office.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger said the county’s growing crime rate must be curbed, KABC reported.

“The answer to fighting crime is twofold, perpetrators must face consequences when breaking the law and funding must be directed to support crime prevention strategies,” Barger said.

Supervisor Barger might do well to recall that the best-proven crime prevention strategy we have seen over the last several decades is to get criminals off the street and hold them away from civil society.  But instead of even whispering this well-established fact, we continue to see criminal justice “reformers”  —  and increasingly, Joe Biden’s Justice Department  —  wail about the “mass incarceration.”