BY MICHAEL LANSU
Homicide Watch Chicago
After consecutive years of record low murder totals, killings rose nearly 30 percent compared to the first quarter of 2014.
The 80 murders through the first three months of the year is the highest first quarter murder total since since 117 people were slain in the first three months of 2012, according to Chicago Police data.
After the unusually violent 2012, murders fell 47 percent in the first three months of 2013. The 62 killings in the first quarter of 2014 were the fewest slayings during that span since 1958.
The 80 killings so far this year are five more than in 2011, the year Mayor Rahm Emanuel took office.
Police Supt. Garry McCarthy said the overall strategy that led to record-low murder totals in 2013 and 2014 will remain in place, adding that the department is always "constantly refine our strategies."
"We will continue building on our community policing philosophy, putting more officers in high crime areas, intervening in gang conflicts, and fostering stronger relationships with the communities we serve," McCarthy said in a statement.
McCarthy stressed the need to get illegal guns off the streets.
"We are law enforcement. The way you stop shootings is to arrest people with guns," according to McCarthy, who said 55 percent of people arrested with guns were released and back on the streets. "I think that what we have been doing has been working really well. We need backup from the rest of the system."
The increase in killings can in part be attributed to at least five double homicides so far this year, compared to only one during the first quarter of both 2013 and 2014.
While some criminologists say the cooler winter weather leads to a decrease in murders, a higher than normal first quarter murder total happened as recently as 2012 -- and the spike is not necessarily an indicator for future killings.
In 2012, 23 percent of the year's murder total happened in the first three months, which usually accounts for only 15 percent of the total, according to police data.
The Cook County medical examiner's office, which counts all homicides whereas police count murders by following federal guidelines, reported 83 homicides in the first three months of the year -- a majority concentrated in specific neighborhoods on the South and West sides.
The Austin community, which had the most killings of Chicago's 77 communities, also had the most slayings in the first quarter of the year with seven. The Roseland community was second with five killings.
In addition to more people being killed, police reported a 32 percent increase in shooting victims compared to the first three months of last year. The 414 people shot in in the first quarter of the year was the most since 562 people were shot in the first three months of 2012.
However, the 360 shooting incidents in the first quarter of the year are only 14 more than in the first three months of 2013, which finished the year with the fewest shootings on record, according to police data.
Despite the rise in shootings and killings in the first three months of the year, the murder total has been on a general decline since the early 1990s. The city has gone from 943 murders in 1992 to 633 in 2000 to just over 400 in each of the past two years.
Police said that while murders and shootings rose in the first quarter of the year, overall crime fell 5 percent from the first quarter of 2014 and 27 percent from the same time in 2013.
Since taking office, McCarthy has pushed to get illegal guns off the streets and for stricter gun control.
Police said officers have recovered more than 1,500 illegal guns so far this year -- a 22 percent increase compared to 2014 -- and arrests for illegal gun possession are up about 39 percent compared to last year.
"Through our plan, based on community policing and partnerships with residents, we have made significant progress in reducing crime over the past few years, yet we remain challenged by lax laws that make it far too easy for dangerous criminals to access and use illegal guns," McCarthy said in a statement.
McCarthy said this year officers have arrested two people twice within a 90-day span for possession of an illegal gun.
"We get more guns off the street than any city all year," according to McCarthy, who said Chicago Police size more guns than New York and Los Angeles combined. "Things outside of our control are still outside of our control."