Myrtle Beach police see 50% decrease in crime over past 10 years
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. (WBTW) — The Myrtle Beach Police Department presented their 2024 year in review on Tuesday in front of the city council.
Some of the accomplishments include decreased calls for service and intelligence-led strategies to prevent and reduce crime. Chief Amy Prock shared that certain crimes they regularly respond to have decreased nearly 50% since 2015.
The crimes that decreased over the past 10 years are homicides, burglaries, and aggravated assaults. Prock says the addition of 248 new city cameras, expanded neighborhood teams, and innovative technology like the ShotSpotter all contribute to the decrease in incidents.
In 2015, the department responded to 4,909 incidents, and in 2024 that number dropped to 2,578 — which is a 47.48% decrease.
'This path is laid and our foot is on the gas, I will tell you that,' Prock said. 'I look at my team and I look at our community. We work together. We may not always get along, and we may not always agree. But I will tell you this — we work hard and we work together and we find a way to make a difference.'
While those statistics provided by the city is certainly good news for Myrtle Beach, the most recent statistics available from the state paint something different.
The South Carolina Law Enforcement Division's 2023 stats for the violent crime rate of about 49 crimes per 1,000 residents was still higher than both the state and national averages.
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Gracie is a multimedia journalist at News 13 and is from Cleveland, Ohio. Gracie joined the team in June 2023 after graduating from the University of Alabama in May. Follow Gracie on Facebook, Instagram and X, formerly Twitter, & read more of her work here.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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