Montgomery County tied its 1994 homicide record of 34 this week, with the brutal stabbing death of a man in a stairwell at the Shops of Wisconsin in Bethesda. Last night, the County's record was broken with a homicide reported at 6:35 PM in the 19300 block of Circle Gate Drive in Germantown. The record was smashed just as it was revealed that the County police force has shrunk by 56 officers since February 2021. Response times have suffered, and the annual number of police traffic stops plunged from 106,075 in 2019 to only 39,412 in 2020.
Defunding of the police department by the County Council accounts for only 27 of the 56 lost officer positions. The others have resulted from retiring officers not being replaced, and from reduced morale. Perhaps the only relief for County officials who have to own the new record of 35 homicides, is that there are only seven more days in 2021.
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