Memphis breaks homicide record with 214 slayings
Three people were shot and killed Friday in separate incidents, pushing Memphis to 214 homicides — and breaking a one-year record set 23 years ago.
The 214th homicide victim was Christopher Waters, a young Shelby County Schools music teacher who also worked part-time selling musical instruments, said Nick Averwater, a manager at Amro Music. Waters served as a specialist in orchestra instruments for the music store and he was passionate about introducing music to kids. "It wasn’t just about getting an instrument," Averwater said. "He would teach them how to hold it and teach them how to make their first sounds.”
He was also an instructor in Harmonic South String Orchestra, a new summer music program for kids in South Memphis.
His death is a big loss for the city and all the people whose lives he touched, Averwater said.
“I know this was the murder that broke the record for Memphis. I hope we can celebrate what a great person he was, too.”
Waters was originally from Nashville and was a performing violist throughout the region, according to his biography on the Amro website.
The record tally puts Memphis in line with other major cities with surging homicide rates, such as Chicago. Other cities including Louisville and Tulsa also set records for homicides this month.
Police officials point to gangs, domestic violence and access to guns as common threads in a majority of the homicides.
The number of homicides has swung up and down over the last two decades. Last year, the city recorded 161 homicides. In 2010, the number dipped to a record low 112 homicides. This year, there have been more than 100 more homicides than there were in 2010.
Memphis reaches a grim milestone with 200 homicides
"Unfortunately, it’s almost impossible to intervene when some make the decision to commit murder. I have previously asked the community to take a stand and demand that these killings stop," said Memphis Police Director Michael Rallings in a statement Friday when Memphis reached 213 homicides, tying the record set in 1993.
In his weekly e-mail newsletter, Mayor Jim Strickland addressed the violent toll and what the city is doing to address the issue, including recruiting and retaining police officers, advocating for stiffer penalties for violent crimes and providing more opportunities for youths. "Our homicide rate has taken this tragic, shameful spike. It is the crime that the police are least able to control. It is on all of us, in our homes, our neighborhoods, and our churches, to do better."
The latest deadly spate began at 3 a.m. Friday when 59-year-old Jarvis Hinds was shot and killed on Benford Street in South Memphis. An hour later, police were called to an apartment in the 3100 block Monterray Square, near the University of Memphis where a 23-year-old woman was shot to death.
The 214th homicide - the death of the music teacher - was discovered shortly after 10 a.m. Officers responded to a call in the 5400 block of Pipers Gap in Raleigh — public records show that the teacher bought the house in July. Officers arrived and found the victim with a gunshot wound in a possible home invasion, police said.
Averwater, the teacher's coworker, said the death was discovered after the principal from Belle Forrest Community School called the music store Friday morning. Averwater said he picked up the phone, and the principal told him Waters hadn't arrived for work. That was a big red flag because Waters was a dependable, hard-working person. A manager from the store and a staffer from the school drove to Raleigh and arrived at the house at around the same time.
The music store employee noticed blood and glass on the floor and called police, Averwater said.
There have been no arrests in the three Friday homicides.
"I have a message to those that choose to be on the other side of the law and terrorize the citizens of Memphis," Rallings said. "We will not rest. We will not stop. We will find you and we will bring you to justice."
Lt. Col. Don Crowe, head of MPD's investigative services, said it is hard to pinpoint the reason for the homicide spike.
"Keep in mind that there are educational experts that study this throughout the country, and they are much more qualified than a police officer to analyze the causes of homicides," Crowe said. "Our specialty is investigating homicides, so we always recommend go to the experts to discuss causes and reasons for homicides."
Both Crowe and Rallings said it will take police and the community working together to reduce the homicide rate.
"We want to do our part and we want to ask the community to do their part. Walk away from an argument. Don't escalate it," Crowe said.
Homicide detectives have been working overtime and have made arrests in 74 percent of the cases, he said. Police officials said 18 cases have been ruled justifiable by the Shelby County District Attorney General’s Office.
Crowe said half of this year's homicides have occurred in three police precincts — in the Raines Station precinct which covers Whitehaven, Westwood and southwest Memphis, in the Old Allen precinct that encompasses Frayser, Raleigh and North Memphis and the Mt. Moriah precinct with includes southeast Memphis.
Other cities are also grappling with an increase in homicides.
The homicide rate for the nation’s 30 largest cities is projected to increase 13 percent for 2016, according to a September analysis by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.
"We saw a lot of cities that had small changes in the murder rate you could almost chalk up to year to year variations," said Ames Grawert, one of the authors of the analysis and a counsel with the Brennan Center. "In other cities like Chicago ... there was clearly something behind it."
Grawert is said 2016's uptick in homicides can be largely attributed to cities like Chicago, where the number of homicides have soared.
The report examined many possible causes for the increase such as long-term socieconomic conditions like unemployment and poverty, gang violence, and volume of police officers, but could not come to a definitive conclusion because of a lack of data.
Although Memphis is included in the analysis as one of the 30 largest cities, Grawert said crime data from the city was not part of the report because the Memphis Police Department did not provide any information. The report lists Memphis as one of eight cities that did not respond to the authors' data request in time for publication.
Balloon releases and candlelight vigils have become frequent scenes across the city as family and friends mourn the deaths of their loved ones.
On a recent afternoon in Parkway Village, Earl Price said he was well aware of the city's deadly violence. He said violent crimes would be less common if there were fewer abandoned and blighted buildings and more community services available to keep youth busy.
"When you don’t put interest in the community, it changes them (residents)," Price said as he raked leaves in a yard on Forest Glen Street. "An occupied mind would take that criminal activity away."
Bryan Burton stood on the sidewalk in his Frayser neighborhood this week and watched as police officers carried out evidence in the fatal shooting of his neighbor. He shook his head in disbelief.
"I just moved here in October," Burton said. "I thought I had moved to a safer neighborhood than my old one. These killings have got to stop. We've had too many this year."
Memphis homicides: 1993-2016
1993: 213
1994: 179
1995: 190
1996: 159
1997: 160
1998: 135
1999: 141
2000: 152
2001: 156
2002: 162
2003: 138
2004: 118
2005: 154
2006: 160
2007: 164
2008: 168
2009: 147
2010: 112
2011: 147
2012: 157
2013: 150
2014: 168
2015: 161
2016: 214
Source: Memphis Police Department