Despite being down several hundred officers in 2022, the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) have been taking big steps towards making the city a safer place for everyone. The streets of Minneapolis have undergone a shift in community atmosphere over the years and has had an effect on the people of Minneapolis but also on the MPD officers. One of the main priorities MPD hopes to accomplish to keep the community protected is gun safety.
Keeping guns off the street helps to prevent further crimes to be committed down the road including the protection of the innocent caught in accidents. The city's third and fourth precincts saw the biggest decrease in crime for Minneapolis which is a huge accomplishment for them despite the lack of resources. Violent crimes in Minneapolis decreased in 2022 with robberies and carjackings down nearly 19% and homicides by 17%. Chief of Police, Brian O’Hara, says about 1,000 guns were recovered in 2022 which is equivalent of confiscating 3 guns per night. The MPD reported “there was a 5.3% increase in the number of guns confiscated in 2021. “It's an astronomical amount of guns--basically 1,100 firearms taken off the street from people who should hot have them.”
The work of MPD officers and law enforcement partners has been intentional due to those statistics. Focusing on the one percent meaning “the worst of the worst--those pulling the triggers of these illegal guns” is the main reason gun safety has been a high priority for MPD. Fortunately, there was a large joint investigation that led to a big drop in gunfire. O'Hara states “This resulted in an arrest in someone we believed was trafficking ghost firearms as well as switches, which are devices that enable guns to fire automatically, and since that arrest in August of the 2022 year we've seen a remarkable decrease in the amount of automatic gunfire detected in the city." Because of this, the city is seeing promising results. "There are well over 100 fewer victims of gun violence in 2022 of non-fatal shooting victims and there are 17 fewer homicide victims in the city. While it's certainly not a victory lap--there is still an outrageous amount of gun violence in this city, "O'Hara said.
It is reassuring to see the bravery and resilience the MPD is striving towards to keep those violent crime numbers down for the communities safety and the departments safety as well. The relationships the department keeps with the community is key and helps keep the harmony between the people of Minneapolis and the MPD. O’Hara and his MPD officers hope to ride the momentum into the new year by making plans to keep the city safe as residents welcomed in 2023 and continue to do so for the rest of the year.
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