KANSAS CITY, Mo. — In 2024, Kansas City, Missouri, saw the lowest number of homicides in the last six years, but the number of non-fatal shootings rose, according to KCPD.
Following the deadliest year on record in 2023, KCMO saw about a 20% reduction in homicides from 182 to 144 in 2024.
Although, from Jan. 1 to Dec. 12, 553 people suffered non-fatal gunshot wounds in the city, which is up 12% from the same time last year.
At a press conference on Tuesday, KCMO Mayor Quinton Lucas, KCPD Chief Stacey Graves, and Jackson County Prosecutor-Elect Melesa Johnson credited strengthening collaboration efforts across police, public safety, the prosecutor's office, and city hall with reducing homicides.
“In 2024, we were proud — and I thank the chief for this — to have a good, collaborative police budget conversation in Kansas City that ensured that we could have pay raises for our officers and make sure we could take care of our staff and the needs of criminal justice in Kansas City," Lucas said.
KCPD says a solution to both violent and non-violent crime is increasing police patrols in neighborhoods.
After a summer full of property crimes, small business owners asked for an increase in police presence.
Graves said 2024 was the first time in years that KCPD hired more officers than it lost to retirement and other causes.
"We flooded areas, we increased our presence, and that's part of our goal in 2025 is to continue to build patrol, put more officers in cars," she said.
Graves said KCPD "made a lot of arrests in property crimes" in 2024.
"I feel like we're on a good trajectory as far as our success rate for that," she said.
This year saw the launch of SAVE KC.
"SAVE KC is an academically proven, data-informed strategy that focuses on the small number of people causing the majority of violence in our community," Johnson said.
The city held three "call-ins" this year with people known to have committed a crime. Johnson said the meetings had "decent participation," and attendees heard from speakers, including mothers who have lost their children to gun violence.
"We are seeing success in proactively reaching these individuals, and giving them tools to change their lives before it's too late," Johnson said.
City officials have one last request for the community in 2024: "Put the guns down this New Year's Eve," Lucas said.
In July, Gov. Mike Parson signed Blair's Law into effect. The bill's name honors Blair Shanahan-Lane, who was struck and killed by celebratory gunfire in 2011 in KCMO. Celebratory gunfire is outlawed in city limits across Missouri.
KSHB 41 reporter Lily O’Shea Becker covers Franklin and Douglas counties in Kansas. Share your story idea with Lily.
—
