WORCESTER, Mass. - The Worcester Police Department reports homicides in the city are up sharply from 6 in 2023 to 16 in 2024. While the department works to lower all forms of crime, they said the 16 homicides are concerning and not what they see as the norm for the city.

“Highest year we've had a very long time," Lt. Sean Murtha said, "obviously concerning to us.”

Murtha said one thing balancing out the sharp increase in homicides is almost every other crime category was down last year.

“From stabbings, to robberies, to non-fatal shootings; dropped sharply," Murtha said. "Non-fatal shootings are actually half of what they were in 2023. So, while the fatal homicides are up, everything else has been on a multiyear decline and continue that decline last year.”

Worcester experienced 12 homicides in 2022. The 16 in 2024 mark the highest in the city in almost 4 decades according to FBI crime data.

“This is probably the most important (crime category) of all of them," Murtha said. "So, while the last ten years has seen most categories declined sharply, it's been a pretty good trend, this one year was an aberration.”

Murtha said it’s difficult to predict future crime statistics, but the department is hopeful 2024 remains as an outlier.

“Last year there were very few gang homicides," Murtha said. "There's a lot of crimes of passion, a lot of domestics; unusually high number of domestic homicides last year. Also, there are a few fights between friends. There was one that was a reckless use of a gun. So, it was a little unusual in that it wasn't a case of people known to each other shooting back and forth like it sometimes is. This was domestics and sort of more unusual circumstances.”

The department has said annual crime statistics assist with assessing and tailoring policing strategies moving forward.