Only eight days into 2013, Chicago is already on a grim pace to not only continue the bloody trend of an elevated homicide rate -- but to surpass it.
NBC Chicago pointed out that, as of Sunday, 12 people had been murdered in Chicago this year, which, at a rate of two a day, but the city on a pace for a devastating 730 homicides, higher than any one-year murder total in Chicago since 1997.
By comparison, New York City has logged seven murders through Jan. 7, its first of the year on Jan. 3. Detroit had six homicides this year through Sunday, according to NBC.
Since Sunday, a 24-year-old male was fatally shot around 6 a.m. Tuesday in the 4000 block of West Wilcox Street in the city's East Garfield Park neighborhood, the Chicago Sun-Times reports. Per DNAinfo Chicago, the victim's name has not yet been released pending the notification of his family.
At least eight other people were wounded in non-fatal shootings concentrated on the city's south and west sides between Monday evening and Tuesday morning.
Chicago's homicide rate has already grabbed a number of national headlines in the new year. It was the subject of two features on NPR's Morning Edition this week, including a Monday segment that featured Alex Kotlowitz, "There Are No Children Here" author and "The Interrupters" director, and a Tuesday segment exploring how the city's gun laws impact its crime rate. The New York Times last Thursday ran an analysis on the city's homicide rate on its front page.
On the heels of the negative publicity, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Police Superintendent Garry McCarthy on Tuesday announced their new plans for the city's CAPS community policing program which they described as a revitalization that will help deter crime.
According to NBC, the program's resources will be decentralized moving forward allowing strategies to be tailored more effectively to each specific police district. Each district will be assigned a CAPS sergeant, plus two police officers, a community organizer and a youth services provider.
McCarthy on Tuesday also pointed out that the city's police force has already confiscated 180 guns in the new year.
Last year, 506 homicides were logged in Chicago, only 25 percent of which were either solved, as of Friday, or cleared "exceptionally," according to DNAinfo. McCarthy blamed the low clearance rate rate on a pervasive "no-snitch code." Chicago police union president Michael Shields blamed an understaffed and overwhelmed city detective division.
Christopher Matthias contributed to this report from New York.
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