Crime is soaring in Seattle, Washington, in the wake of the city council’s decision to “defund the police” partially in the wake of the George Floyd riots, Black Lives Matter protests, and “Capitol Hill Occupied Protest” (CHOP) of the summer of 2020.
Last quarter, the city recorded 13 homicides, the most in six years. Seattle is on a pace to surpass last year’s crime numbers — which were worse than the year before, the Seattle Times reported: “Last year, 88 people were fatally shot and 372 were wounded by gunfire in King County, surpassing 2020’s record high of 69 firearm-related homicides and 268 shooting injuries that were largely attributed to the stressors of the pandemic.”