7 New Homicides in Chicago Bring New Rebuke From Trump

'Totally out of control,' says the president
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Feb 24, 2017 7:43 AM CST
Chicago Had 760 Murders Last Year. This Year Might Be Worse
Police tape litters the ground at the scene of a Feb. 14, shooting in Chicago.   (AP Photo/Teresa Crawford)

Chicago's 760 homicides made 2016 its deadliest year in two decades—but 2017 is on track to steal that title. The city experienced its deadliest day of the new year on Wednesday when seven people were killed—five in a two-hour period—including a pregnant woman in her 20s. That brought the total for the year to 91 homicides as of Wednesday, according to police data, on par with the total of 93 at this time last year. The Chicago Tribune, however, uses a different metric that includes expressway shootings and police-involved shootings, and it puts the total at 99. By the newspaper's data, the city reached that figure two days earlier than last year.

Either way, it's "unacceptable to me, to the Mayor and to everyone who lives in Chicago," wrote police Superintendent Eddie Johnson to the Chicago Sun-Times. President Trump appears to agree: "Totally out of control," he tweeted. "Chicago needs help!" Last week, Trump said Chicago is "worse than almost any of the places in the Middle East" and, prior to that, suggested he might "send in the Feds," without elaborating. In addition to the pregnant woman, who was eight months along, Wednesday's victims included a 24-year-old transgender woman and a 60-year-old grandfather on his way to work, per the Tribune. "I couldn't imagine this in my wildest dreams," says the pregnant woman's mother. "She was big enough to give birth any day," adds an uncle. (More Chicago stories.)

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