Posted on November 12, 2021

After Violent Weekend, Indianapolis Breaks Criminal Homicide Record With 218 Deaths

Lawrence Andrea and Sarah Nelson, Indianapolis Star, November 8, 2021

A violent weekend in Indianapolis left three people dead and pushed the city past another grim milestone. With just under two months left in 2021, Indianapolis has broken its criminal homicide record for the second consecutive year.

The city surged past the record during a weekend not unlike many others so far this year. Early Saturday morning, a man was shot to death outside a bar in the 5400 block of Massachusetts Avenue. Then, on Sunday, a man was shot inside a downtown Five Guys restaurant. He died at a hospital.

Another person was shot and killed at 1 a.m. Monday near a residential area in the 5200 block of Butler Terrace on the northeast side of the city, according to Indianapolis Metropolitan Police. At least five other people were wounded in shootings over the weekend.

The deaths marked 217 criminal homicides in Indianapolis — a new record. Police on Monday afternoon ruled a man’s deathin an east-side fire last week a homicide, pushing that number to 218. The city recorded 215 criminal homicides in all of 2020, a figure that shattered the previous record of 159 set in 2018, according to an IndyStar analysis of homicide data.

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No fewer than 16 people have been killed in each of the first 10 months of the year, data show. October tied July for deadliest months of the year, both with 32 total homicides. During one week in the middle of October, 15 people were killed. All of the July homicides were labeled criminal by police, and only about three killings in October were justified. There were four homicides in the first week of November.

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The violence has prompted pleas from community leaders and neighborhood groups to stop the violence. At the end of October, a handful of Indianapolis community members called for a three-day “ceasefire” to the violence for the Halloween weekend.

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That ceasefire lasted just two days.

A man was shot to death near the corner of 32nd and Hovey streets Halloween morning, hours before kids set out to trick-or-treat.