65 Percent Of Homicides Go Unsolved In Baltimore: Study

BALTIMORE, MD — More than half of the homicides in America’s 50 largest cities went unsolved over the past 10 years, according to data compiled by The Washington Post. Baltimore was no exception.

Approximately 51 percent of homicides nationwide did not result in an arrest from 2007 to 2017, according to the Post's analysis of 52,000 criminal homicides.

In Baltimore, 65 percent of homicides tracked over the past decade went unsolved, according to the analysis.

According to the Post’s data, there were 2,827 homicides in Baltimore between 2007 and 2017.

Approximately 35 percent of these homicides resulted in an arrest. Officials said that 152 of the homicides were cleared without an arrest.

The Post mapped 15 zones in Baltimore where there were high levels of homicide and the arrest rate in those cases was less than 30 percent. In nearby Washington, D.C., there were only two such zones.

The 15 zones in Baltimore are spread throughout the city, with the highest concentration of unsolved homicides in northwestern Baltimore around the central Park Heights area, according to the Post's study.

While the majority of homicide victims in Baltimore were black, the arrest rates were highest in cases where the victims were white, according to the Post’s findings. That was consistent with the trend identified by the Post nationally. The Post found that in 44 of the 47 cities where a victim’s race was reliably recorded, a white victim’s homicide resulted in an arrest more often than a minority victim’s homicide.

Other findings from the Post’s analysis:

• 34 of the 50 cities analyzed have a lower homicide arrest rate now compared to a decade ago
• Killings have increased in 17 cities over the past decade and police now make fewer arrests in these cities
• An arrest was made in 63 percent of homicides of white victims compared with 48 percent of Latino victims and 46 percent of black victims
• Almost all the low-arrest zones are home primarily to low-income black residents

Read the full analysis from The Post here.

The Post's data shows that after the 2015 riots, arrests in relation to homicides decreased in Baltimore.

Over the past few years, the department has been working on repairing community relations. The police department and city of Baltimore signed a binding agreement with the Department of Justice in 2017 committing to police reform following a federal investigation. The probe revealed that the Baltimore Police Department had routinely violated people's rights, making unconstitutional stops, searches and arrests; demonstrated severe and unjustified disparities in the rates of stops, searches and arrests of African-Americans; used excessive force; and retaliated against people engaging in constitutionally protected expression. The Justice Department studied policing in the city from 2010 to 2016 in making its assessment.

Since 2017, there has also been turbulence from within the police department itself. Several officers were convicted in a racketeering scheme for using their power to rob and falsely charge citizens; former Police Commissioner Kevin Davis was fired in January; and his successor resigned in May after being federally charged for failing to file his taxes.

USA Today named Baltimore the most dangerous city in America in 2017 for its murder rate per capita.

• Baltimore Is America's Most Dangerous City, Analysis Finds
• Baltimore Riots: State Of Emergency Declared After Fires, Looting
• Baltimore Commits To Police Reform Outlined By Feds

— By Feroze Dhanoa and Elizabeth Janney

Photo by Elizabeth Janney.