Homicides are down in Prince George’s Co. — but not by enough, police chief says
Though violent crime in Prince George’s County, Maryland, dropped in 2024 — the county still saw over 100 murders. The county’s police chief hopes those numbers keep going down in 2025.
According to Prince George’s County crime data, 113 homicides were committed in 2024 — a 5% decrease from the previous year, according to Chief Malik Aziz.
“It should be noted that we had 21 domestic-related homicides in our county,” Aziz said at a press conference detailing the county’s crime data. “What I often say is that one homicide is one too many.”
Nonfatal shootings dropped by 8%, according to the same data. Aziz said he hopes the county’s new Gun Crimes Unit, created in 2024, will help lower annual homicides to less than 100 — which hasn’t happened in several years.
The Gun Crimes Unit was established to investigate all cases in which a person in the county is injured by gunfire, as well as any other crimes involving the discharge of a firearm. Before the unit was formed, crimes committed with guns were investigated across several different units.
“We had eight different divisions, handling gun crimes individually,” Aziz said. “And when it was fragmented, that meant that we didn’t have anything centralized to connect suspects and incidents.”
Overall, violent crime in Prince George’s County dropped by 2%. And for the first time since before the COVID-19 pandemic, carjacking rates in the county also fell: In 2024, the county investigated about 340 carjackings compared to 550 the previous year — a 33% decrease.