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The sizable fall in homicides comes after a record high in murders was set in 2020 at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic when courts were mostly closed and jail populations were being drastically reduced in an attempt to curb the spread of the virus.

\"Certainly, after it hit, we saw backlogs of cases and delayed trials and things like that,\" White said. \"There was no real accountability for bad acts.\"

According to the FBI's annual Uniform Crime Reporting Program, which analyzed data from 15,897 law enforcement agencies, the largest single-year jump in murders in more than a century occurred between 2019 and 2020 as murders and nonnegligent manslaughter offenses nationwide rose nearly 30%.

Homicides across the country continued to increase in 2021 by 4.3% before falling by 6% in 2022, according to the FBI report.

'A very simple strategy'

San Antonio, Texas, the nation's seventh biggest city, has experienced a nearly 12% decline in homicides this year, after seeing murders rise by 43% in 2022 compared to 2021.

San Antonio Police Chief William McManus told ABC News that the 231 homicides that occurred in his city in 2022, included the deaths of 53 migrants found in the back of an abandoned tractor-trailer as part of a human smuggling operation.

\"If you're looking at including those numbers, we're looking at about a 32% decrease. But if you extract those numbers, we're looking at a 12% decrease year-to-date,\" McManus said. \"But we're not complaining about 12% though.\"

One of the multiple crimefighting strategies McManus attributed to his city's falling homicide numbers was first suggested by a team of criminologists at the University of Texas at San Antonio.

\"Actually, it was a very simple strategy that, quite frankly, I was somewhat skeptical of at first,\" McManus said.

\"PHOTO:
Eric Gay/AP
PHOTO: San Antonio police chief William McManus,, center, joins thousands of walkers as they take part in a march honoring Martin Luther King Jr. in San Antonio, Texas, Jan. 16, 2023.
>

He said by examining calls to the city's computer-aided dispatch system (CAD), the police department identified 28 areas of the city with the highest numbers of violent crime calls and even pinpointed certain days and times when the volume of calls is the highest.

\"We will sit there at that location with our emergency lights on for 10 to 15 minutes. That's about as proactive as it gets,\" McManus said. \"We're not getting out stopping people or knocking on doors or anything like that. It's simply a high visibility, hot-spot policing effort.\"

McManus said that in the coming year, he plans to try other crimefighting strategies involving the city's public works department and animal control services.

\"Specifically, to mention Animal Care Services, if you have a bunch of dogs running around, it brings the quality of life in that neighborhood down,\" McManus said. \"If you have a bunch of abandoned properties that are not being tended to, it brings the quality of life of that neighborhood down. Those properties could be used for drug sales, drug use, prostitution, all those things that make a neighborhood feel unsafe.\"

Another strategy is to \"address specific actors that are involved in violent crime,\" he said.

\"We pull them in, most of them are under supervision, and we offer them services, we offer them possible employment. If you choose to accept that type of help, whatever it may be, then good for you,\" McManus said. \"But if you don't, then the next time you're arrested, we're going to throw the book at you.\"

'Recipe for success'

In Phoenix, the nation's fifth largest city, interim Police Chief Michael Sullivan credited a 15% decline in homicides this year to a crimefighting strategy focused on clearing the streets of violent criminals in possession of guns.

\"We know that if we focus on those areas, we're going to see reductions, and we did this year,\" Sullivan told ABC News.

Sullivan said his department launched \"Operation Summer Shield\" this year, which involved the help of federal and other local law enforcement agencies to round up people with warrants for their arrests. He said the operation resulted in the arrests of 580 people, with 70% wanted for felonies.

\"I think we seized 40 guns from those prohibited possessors,\" Sullivan said.

\"Phoenix
Anthony Behar/PA via AP
Phoenix Interim Police Chief Michael Sullivan, pictured here during the Super Bowl LVII Public Safety Press Conference in Phoenix on Feb. 7, 2023, said homicides have fallen in his city by 15% this year.
>

Sullivan said he has also used the strategy of putting detectives on the streets during the summer months to help increase patrols, saying, such a move has \"been very important in helping us control the homicide number this year.\"

Like in Detroit, Sullivan said non-fatal shootings, which he described as \"truly failed homicides,\" are down 18% this year and attributes that to the launch of a \"Non-Fatal Shooting Investigation Squad\" that responds whenever a bullet pierces the skin to assist or assume the investigation.

But like other police chiefs in cities with falling homicide numbers, Sullivan said community engagement has been the most beneficial in the post-pandemic era.

\"Community engagement is much easier when you're not doing it on a Zoom call, when you're having face-to-face meetings with the community and being able to build that trust,\" Sullivan said. \"When I talk about community engagement, you put a lot of deposits in the bank before people trust enough to be able to give us the information to close crimes.\"

Sullivan said his agency has also focused on recruiting the best officers for the job.

\"What we would expect from our police departments is to have a good strategy. But then you have to have women and men who can go out and execute that strategy,\" Sullivan said. \"That’s what we have here at the Phoenix Police Department, and I believe that’s a recipe for success.\"

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