Chief: Duluth’s 4th Homicide Of 2018 Is Not A ‘Trend or Pattern’

DULUTH, Minn. – Monday’s shooting death of Kevin Weiss, 35, in the Gary-New Duluth neighborhood is the fourth homicide in Duluth in 2018, but Duluth Police Chief Mike Tusken says “an uptick of one or two does not constitute a sustained trend or pattern.”

Tusken goes on to say, “It is an increase and yet we acknowledge it is difficult for police to prevent homicides where people know and/or live with each other and police and the criminal justice system has not had the opportunity to do intervention.  All homicides this year involve people who knew and/or lived with each other.”

Tusken provided the following homicide statistics since 2010 with 17 total deaths:

Meanwhile, Tusken points to a particularly concerning three-year period from 1999 to 2001 when there was a total of 19 homicides.  While the homicides landed into three separate years, Tusken said those deaths only happened over a span of roughly 18 months.

For the latest on the homicide investigation of Weiss, click here.