Baltimore pushes to reduce shootings in 2024, police offer incentives to get officers back

BALTIMORE -- Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott joined city leaders on Wednesday to tout progress made in their crime reduction strategies.

In 2023, Baltimore City made notable improvements to public safety.

Scott and other city officials addressed the strategies they believe were most effective in reducing violent crime, and how the city plans to continue the downward crime trend.    

"I made it very clear from the very start of my administration that public safety was our No. 1 priority and we would be approaching public safety in the right way and learn from the many mistakes of the past."

For the first time since 2014, the city had fewer than 300 homicides, according to the Mayor's office. 

Scott said homicides were down 20% in 2023, and non-fatal shootings were down 6.8%.

The mayor also said that 263 people were killed in Baltimore City last year, which is a decrease of 67 from 2022.

"While this is meaningful progress, the disease of gun violence continues to plague our community, and none of us you see here today are ready to celebrate," Scott said. "We are ready to push this work even further." 

Scott said juvenile violence and illegal guns are major issues that need to be improved. 

"Guns continue to flow from outside Baltimore into the hands of young people, and other individuals, who are using them to deal death and destruction on our streets and in our neighborhoods," Scott said.

It follows the city's first homicide of 2024 on North Bentalou Street and another shooting just a short distance away on Tuesday. 

"It's horrible. We are scared for our children. We can't even walk through the neighborhoods. It's sad," said Dejournette, who lives in Southwest Baltimore and declined to give her last name. 

"We just have to continue the work. What you hear from us is not a celebratory tone," the mayor said of the continuing challenges.

Scott had harsh words for the juvenile justice system. 

"The system of juvenile justice in this state needs to be reimagined. The system needs to be changed so that we balance the accountability that needs to be there," the mayor said.  "The fact that we're talking about 12, 13, 14-year-olds who need services, we can save many of them and those who we can't, there needs to be consequences, but we need to entirely rebuild the system."

Baltimore Police Commissioner Richard Worley addressed the shortage of officers and said he is working on new ways to get those who have left the department to come back. 

"I just signed numerous letters yesterday to offer an incentive to officers who have left over the last three years to come back, but even if we hired 500 new cops today, we are not going to see any residual effect of it for all of 2024," Commissioner Worley told reporters.

2023 did have its share of notable violence. Last July, two young adults were killed and 28 people were injured in Baltimore's largest mass shooting.

Then, in October, during Homecoming Week, five people were injured in a shooting on the campus of Morgan State University.

Related: EXCLUSIVE: Mayor Brandon Scott talks fatherhood and politics with WJZ

In the early part of 2022, Scott set up a Group Violence Reduction Strategy, with a focus on rehabilitating individuals and reducing violent crime.

The plan - which included partnering with organizations and residents to slow violent crime in Baltimore - was expanded in December 2022 after a year that saw 300+ homicides for the ninth year in a row.

"I knew deep in my heart that we needed to do something different, and so we did something different," Scott said. "We did something that Baltimore had never done before. We asked residents what they needed to see in a public safety strategy, crafted, developed and designed to serve residents over multiple years and developed a truly comprehensive approach to solving the disease of gun violence."

"In partnership with residents of Baltimore and across the city, we set forth an ambitious, comprehensive violence prevention plan to address violence in our communities as a public health issue - the first ever in Baltimore's history," Scott added.

The Gun Violence Reduction Strategy will expand into the central and eastern police districts in 2024.

"We're looking very closely at the integrity of the strategy every step of the way and if we needed to take more time to get it right. We're going to do so because the last thing we want to happen is moving so fast that the strategy breaks and falls apart," said Stefanie Mavronis, from the Mayor's Office of Neighborhood Safety and Engagement.

Mavronis said GVRS has provided intensive assistance to 132 people. 

"A key goal of the strategy is to reduce revictimization and retaliation.  …Since the start of the strategy, the 4.3 percent revictimization and 5 percent recidivism rate is evidence of our success," Mavronis said.  "Again, we're talking about the individuals who we've identified as being at risk of gun violence."

In September, the Department of Juvenile Services launched Thrive Academy which focuses on the most at-risk youth in Baltimore City and County. 

Thrive Academy will provide life coaching, therapy and even relocation services for teens and their families who are in danger.

"We understand that young people in Baltimore continue to experience acute levels of violence and trauma," Scott said. "To achieve and sustain long-term public safety we have to address that problem head on which is why we continue to prioritize diversion and intervention, specifically tailored to supporting our young people."

Scott also credited the efforts of the Baltimore Police Department and state and federal law enforcement agencies.

"Baltimoreans lives and the future of our city are on the line. No single entity can do it alone," Scott said. 

The Maryland General Assembly will gather next week for legislative session. Among many issues on the agenda, a main focus will be on public safety.

"We are tired of finding gun violence victims and perpetrators of gun violence in our neighborhoods with an ankle monitor on," Scott said. 

The mayor noted one of the suspects in the Brooklyn Homes mass shooting was on GPS monitoring at the time of the crime. 

Doctors are increasingly on the front lines of public safety in Baltimore, as we saw during the Brooklyn shooting. 

Emergency room physician Lucas Carlson, with MedStar Health, attended Wednesday's press briefing and told WJZ his team helps connect people to resources.

"Whether it's employment opportunities, social resources, food support or housing support so they have the best structure in their life to prevent the cycle of violence from continuing," Dr. Carlson said. "We all know that violence isn't just a criminal justice issue. It's a public health issue, and I think it's important that we're looking at it from that lens."