© Ellen Schmidt/Las Vegas Review-JournalLas Vegas police investigate a homicide in the 5000 block of Sagelyn Street, near Tropicana Avenue and Boulder Highway, on Wednesday, Dec. 15, 2021, in Las Vegas. A year-end tally found that police in and around Las Vegas investigated at least 245 homicides in 2021, up from a previous high of 264 killings in 2017 that included 58 in an Oct. 1 mass shooting at a concert on the Las Vegas Strip.
Law enforcement sources say the criminal justice reform movement sweeping states, combined with policies of liberal prosecutors, leave them with fewer cooperating witnesses whom they need to crack homicide and other serious criminal cases.
"Criminal justice reform is crushing investigations. I apprehended individuals on something minor, and they wanted to make a deal because they didn't want to go to jail. Now we don't have the snitch pool of low-level offenders willing to talk about bigger fish. It's huge and it's such a simple concept," said Paul Beakman, a former police officer and former president of the Fraternal Order of Police Western New York Lodge 103.
It's showing up in the numbers.
The District of Columbia's police force has cleared 49% of its homicide cases through July of this year, compared with 65% during the same period last year. The Metropolitan Police Department ended last year with a 69% clearance rate.
In Cincinnati, police have cleared 61% of homicide cases so far this year, compared with 71% at this point last year. It finished 2021 with a 67% clearance rate.
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