With overall US crime down double digits, what’s boosting violent crime rates in Prince George’s Co.?
Nationwide, crime is trending generally down, and that’s the case in Prince George’s County, Maryland, too — but not when it comes to violent crime, which county police said is up so far this year.
At a Monday afternoon hearing, Prince George’s County Police Chief Malik Aziz offered a quick rundown on where things stand after the first third of the year, as he went over the department’s budget proposal for the upcoming fiscal year.
During the hearing, Aziz said the county’s overall crime is down 13% so far and that nonviolent crime is down 18%. However, he said violent crime is up 11%.
Assaults and domestic violence — especially assaults — account for that spike, Aziz said.
“They take a large part and they fall into the violent crime category. But … a lot of them are very simple assaults,” he said.
The 29 murders recorded in the county so far this year is slightly ahead of last year’s pace, but Aziz said the county’s murder rate had been on the decline through most of the year. Aziz also said that a third of those murders are related to domestic violence.
Arrests for illegal guns have also gone down so far this year, but Aziz cast doubt on the idea that it’s because there are fewer of them in the wrong hands.
Aziz said police believe “the advent of the new law last July 1, that said that no searches could be conducted of a car that was reeking of cannabis odor” contributed to the downward trend of weapons found on the street. He mentioned that many guns were previously recovered from cars that officers searched while looking for marijuana.
Now, Aziz said most arrests happen when an officer sees a gun inside a vehicle after pulling someone over for another reason — but in any case, he is certain there are more ghost guns in the county than before.
“We’re seeing an increase in 3D-printed weapons,” Aziz said. “Young kids who are more attuned to technology are making those type of weapons … and they are unserialized weapons. They fall in the same category.”
Property crime is down, too, though crimes related to thefts from inside or on the outside of vehicles are on the rise.
In terms of carjackings, there have been nearly 100 in the county so far this year, with juveniles accounting for 50 of the 65 people arrested for the crime. In 2023, the county approached 600 carjackings.