With nine homicides in St. Paul in the last two months — about one-third of the killings in the city this year — St. Paul leaders are calling for anyone with information about people illegally carrying guns to come forward.
Since the end of September, St. Paul officers have shot three homicide suspects who were allegedly armed with guns when they encountered them.
Though efforts to reduce gun violence in St. Paul have been showing success, “we’ve experienced a very disturbing outlier,” St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry said of the recent homicides. “That’s nine too many” on top of the homicides that already happened this year, he said.
Overall, St. Paul has experienced 28 homicides this year, the same number as last year at this time. The number of people injured in shootings has decreased.
When someone fires a gun, “there’s a spouse, there’s a friend, there’s a cousin, there’s a girlfriend, there’s a mother, a father, a grandparent, somebody who knew that that person had a gun and shouldn’t have had,” Mayor Melvin Carter said at a Thursday press conference.
“That’s right. Say it again, mayor,” chimed in Tyrone Terrill, African American Leadership Council president.
556 guns recovered this year
Carter said he knows some people are afraid to call police, but he said it’s “the best thing you can do to keep that person from doing harm to themselves, from doing harm to someone else, from doing harm to your family, is to make sure that we have the information that we need for our big team to be able to engage and intercede.”
Carter asked people to take action by calling the St. Paul police non-emergency number at 651-291-1111, saying they can make a tip anonymously.
St. Paul officers have recovered 556 firearms in the city this year. “That’s a form of prevention,” Henry said. “We’ll never know exactly how many of those guns being recovered have stopped another crime.”
Every week, “we have examples of our officers safely taking violent and armed people into custody with little or no use of force,” Henry said.
This year, St. Paul officers have arrested 329 people who weren’t eligible to have a gun or didn’t have a permit, with 80 percent of them banned by state law because of a previous conviction. “That’s more than one day,” Henry said. “Those are the stories you don’t hear about. Good decisions by our officers and … good decisions by those people being arrested are contributing to many of those successes.”
Fewer people injured in shootings
St. Paul Police Chief Axel Henry answers questions during a press conference to address the recent spate of St. Paul gun violence. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
The nine homicides between Sept. 17 and Nov. 4 have happened under various circumstances. They’ve involved domestic assault, drug deals and robbery.
“They cross the spectrum … but they almost all fall into this category: They involve guns and they involve terrible decisions,” Henry said.
When Henry became police chief at the end of 2022, there were 193 people wounded by gunfire that year. “Our officers … and our partnerships were able to reduce those numbers” to 122 last year, Henry said. This year, there have been 95 people injured in shootings.
People can turn in guns with no questions asked. Community leaders who took part in Thursday’s press conference, including many who weren’t there, “stand ready to broker whatever trust divide is preventing people from calling out the behavior in advance,” Henry said.
With police saying they can’t arrest their way out of the problem, St. Paul’s Office of Neighborhood Safety works with officers and life coaches who have contacted more than 30 people involved with group or gun violence to offer support, but also “let them know that there’s accountability if they’re not willing to engage in those supports,” said Brooke Blakey, the officer’s director.
The Rev. Melvin Miller, St. Paul Black Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance president, speaks about the recent spate of St. Paul gun violence. (John Autey / Pioneer Press)
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The Rev. Melvin Miller, president of the St. Paul Black Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance, said they want to “dispel the myth” that there is no hope and to show young people that there are opportunities. “If you find a young person is stressed and is challenged and is about to make a bad choice, please reach out,” Miller said.
Terrill said an 18-year-old told him the night before that, for the last six weeks, all he’d dreamed about was being killed.
“It was a tough conversation,” he said, adding that community mentors plan to spend more time with the young man. He said the teen’s father was sent to prison about a year ago for having a large amount of fentanyl. “If men stand up, little boys will sit down,” Terrill added.
The NAACP, African American Leadership Council and ministerial alliance are planning a summit in December and are determining the date.
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