Crime is Down - We Swear

Like clockwork, Special Ed holds his press conference on the first of the month to plead the case the crime is down:

• Murders, shootings and other violent crimes during the first four months of 2019 have decreased compared to the same period in 2018, according to data released by Chicago police.
  
  The 136 murders reported between Jan. 1 and April 30 marked a 10 percent decline from the same period last year, while the 541 shootings marked an 8 percent drop from last year and a 41 percent drop from 2016, police said.

The totals don't match the Slum Times counting though:

• The Sun-Times has counted 148 homicides this year within city limits, 62 of which occurred in April.

So Special Ed is hiding a dozen homicides? HeyJackass.com has the homicide count at 145, which doesn't agree with Special Ed or the Times. Amazing how difficult it is to actually count dead bodies.

HeyJackass has a worrying trend though:

• April 2019: 61 killed, 189 wounded
  April 2018: 42 killed, 181 wounded
  April 2017: 49 killed, 270 wounded
  April 2016: 40 killed, 274 wounded
  April 2015: 37 killed, 204 wounded
  April 2014: 37 killed, 232 wounded

April accounted for nearly half of the year-to-date death totals, up almost 20 from last year, and during the wildest swings of weather we've seen in some time. And, they're getting more accurate.