Chicago Police officer | Facebook
Chicago Police officer | Facebook
Chicago had a violent night on April 6, with eight homicides in just over a day’s span.
“8th homicide in the past 26 hours,” w_h_thompson posted on Twitter.
The tweet was in response to a series of posts by Spot News indicating the shootings.
“Male (37) shot & killed, 7836 S Sangamon,” one of the posts reads.
The city’s murder rate has increased 55% since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020. Last year, there were 797 murders in the city, the most since 1996. This coincided with an increase in shooting incidents.
The news comes months after Cook County’s murder rate for 2021 went above 1,000 – double that of 2019. The city last saw 1,000 murders in a year in 1994.
Business owners and residents alike have increasingly been speaking up against the administration of Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.
The murder rate is indicative of the city’s larger crime woes.
Chicago’s failure to incarcerate criminals has been blamed by many for the city's crime problems.
Many claim that the widespread looting in Chicago today is the result of State's Attorney Kim Foxx's 2016 decision to charge only shoplifting above $1,000.
As a result of that decision, shoplifting has become a growing problem, with some businesses closing outright.
Business owners in Chico have warned that permitting rampant criminality by not prosecuting thieves encourages more serious crimes like murder.
Lightfoot previously suggested that amid the climate of crime, business owners should be accountable for their own safety and chastised them for not employing security guards.
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