The DC homicide clearance rate experienced an eight percent decline this year as less than half of murder cases were closed this year which criminologists attribute to the lack of trust with law enforcement amid the country's woke anti-police movement.
The lack of trust in law enforcement has been attributed to the decline in the city's clearance rate as 42 percent homicide cases were reportedly closed in 2021, according to data from DC Witness.
Criminologists have since noted that police reliability is significant staple to solving murder cases as it is necessary to speak with witnesses and conduct thorough investigations.
These specialists also noted that numbers reportedly fluctuate based on these relationships as evidenced by the intense crime rate continuing to spiral throughout the city.
The negative relationship between members of law enforcement and the community has been attributed to events such as the May 2020 murder of George Floyd after Minnesota officer Derek Chauvin sat on his neck for more than nine minutes.
Movements around the country called for police departments to be defunded in response to Floyd's death throughout the summer season of that year.
The homicide clearance rate has seen a significant drop after 50 percent of cases were closed for 2020.
The year 2021 also saw a near thirteen percent increase in homicides as compared to last year with 226 total incidents reported.
The city's overall crime rate also rose by three percent with 28,413 incidents reported in total.
Criminologists report that a lack of trust with local law enforcement has contributed to the eight percent drop in DC homicide clearance rates for 2021
The year 2021 saw a near thirteen percent increase in homicide cases since 2020 as 226 total incidents were reported
The clearance rate dropped from 50 to 42 percent for this year as compared to 2020
'If people are less confident in the police, want to have less contact with the police, they're not going to be as cooperative,' Criminology professor Richard Rosenfeld told Fox News.
'The police therefore lose that valuable form of assistance as they're trying to solve homicides.'
'The police can't clear crimes on their own. Those of us who happened to witness the event are key ingredients in the ability of the police to clear a homicide or any other serious crime with an arrest.'
Criminologists have noted that a lack of trust has contributed to the community's dwindling faith in law enforcement.
'There can be a very vicious cycle involving police efforts to solve homicides, which under circumstances last year and into this year meant that the police were solving fewer homicides,' Rosenfeld also told the network.
'As a result, community confidence in the effectiveness of the police certainly doesn't improve or go up.'
"It very likely decreases. As community confidence in the police decreases … we might expect homicides to go up, increasing the caseload, making it more difficult for the police to solve homicides.'
The trust in police officers is considered to be vital in homicide investigations as evidenced by the decreasing rate
Movements to defund national police departments were implemented in response to events such as the 2020 murder of George Floyd
A Gallup poll from August 2020 demonstrated that trust in law enforcement was at its
