MILWAUKEE — Already there have been 124 homicides this year in Milwaukee.
Police tell TMJ4 that's compared to 62 during the same period in 2019.
Former police chief Alfonso Morales said last spring that three factors are driving the numbers: mental health, drugs and domestic-related situations.
And the COVID-19 pandemic isn’t helping the problem.
In an interview with TMJ4 News in June, Mayor Tom Barrett said he is "concerned" with a spike in homicides this year.
"This year has been very rough, there's no question we've seen a huge increase in both the number of homicides and non-fatal shootings. I am very concerned," Barrett said said at the time.
President and CEO of the Sojourner Family Peace Center, Carmen Pitre, said last spring there is certainly a COVID-19 dynamic to the spike.
“Survivors have reported that abusers are more volatile,” Pitre said. “That would lend me to believe that the stress of COVID is making people who have used violence as a strategy more likely to use it.”
