Do kids feel safe in D.C.? We asked them.
In 2023, crime surged in the District as homicides reached levels not seen in a generation. By the year's end, D.C. police had made more than 500 arrests of people under age 18 for violent crimes — the most in a single year since 2004. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 20 from that age group had died in homicides.
Teens with no previous criminal records were being arrested 'because they put a gun in somebody's face,' said then-D.C. Police Chief Robert J. Contee III at a crime summit in 2023. Students changed schools in fear only to find they could not escape the violence. A council member urged parents to keep their children indoors: 'It's not safe in D.C.'
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