Prince George’s County police are crediting a new crime initiative with reducing the number of homicides that occurred last month, but records show slayings merely fell back to average levels after a rash of homicides in January 2011.
County police placed extra officers in high-crime areas, mostly inside the Capital Beltway, each night in January. Officials sought to avoid a repeat of 2011, when the county began the new year with 15 homicides in the first month.
“We were committed to not having the same January we did last year,” Police Chief Mark Magaw said.
But records show homicides merely fell back to average levels after an abnormal spike last January. From 2008 to 2012, the county averaged 8.2 homicides in January.
Without including the anomaly of 15 homicides in 2011, the county averaged 6.5 homicides a year over that period.
Police pointed to other benefits of the initiative, including the department’s 551 arrests, dozens of guns seized, and nearly $100,000 worth of drugs taken off the street.
Police did not have an estimate of the initiative’s cost. The bulk of the extra officers organized by the department were on regular schedules and did not require overtime, according to Magaw.
Now, police detectives are investigating two shooting deaths that occurred Monday evening, the first homicides of February. Christopher Smith, 16, was shot in New Carrollton, while Alfonso Thompson Jr., 23, was killed in West Lanham Hills nearby.
Based on the similarity of the two shootings and close proximity of where the victims were found, police are investigating whether they are linked, officials said.
And the department’s new inspector general, Carlos Acosta, who Magaw introduced Wednesday morning, is leading an investigation into two officers’ questionable account of a police-involved shooting in Brentwood Friday evening. Video evidence of the incident did not support the officers’ initial reports from the scene, and some charges stemming from the incident against a local teenager were dropped. The officers have been suspended with pay while the investigation continues.
