The Numbers Game … Murder’s Down, But So Is the Truth: Can We Trust CPD’s Crime Stats When They Keep Manipulating the Narrative?

Chicago Police want you to believe the city is turning a corner.

Murders are down 31% this year. Shootings down 39%. Robberies down 34%. The official CompStat report through June 25, 2025, reads like a reformer’s dream.

But before we get too comfortable, ask the real question:

Can we trust the numbers when the same department manipulating them can’t even tell the truth about what’s happening on the streets?

The headlines will say crime is down. The mayor’s office will crow about “progress.” But the truth buried inside the Chicago Police Department’s own numbers tells a different story — not of recovery, but mutation. The killers may be shooting less, but the thieves are just getting started.

Through June 25, 2025, murders in Chicago are down 31% compared to the same point last year. Robberies are down 34%. Shooting victims? Down 39%.

It’s a tidy narrative, perfectly packaged for press conferences and re-election speeches.

But like every well-crafted illusion, it depends on you not looking too closely.

Because that “progress” only looks good when compared to the disaster years — 2021, 2022, and 2023 — when the city all but collapsed under a flood of shootings and bloodshed.

Murders may be down 46% from 2021, but that just means we’re clawing our way out of a hole we never should’ve fallen into.

A 31% drop from hell is still hell.

Meanwhile, other categories are sounding alarms.

Motor vehicle theft is up 4% this year — and a staggering 67% compared to 2021. Carjackers and organized theft rings are thriving, knowing full well that even if they’re caught, the system will coddle them. And while CPD reports “theft” is down 29%, it’s still up 75% from four years ago.

Either the crooks got smarter, or the stats got manipulated.

Then there’s the sexual assault number: flat year-over-year. Not up, not down — just stuck.

One of the most serious violent crimes, and nothing is changing.

No drop. No progress. No explanation.

And the big number politicians love to cite — “index crime” — is down 14% this year. But still up 43% from 2021. If crime were a stock, they’d be calling this a volatile bounce, not a bull run.

A Lakeview Assault That Suddenly Didn’t Happen

On June 29, CPD publicly reported that a 26-year-old woman had been physically and sexually assaulted in an alley off North Wilton in Lakeview. The alert went out citywide. Full narrative. A hospital transport. An active investigation.

Then, just twelve hours later: “Not bona fide.”

The case was reclassified. No follow-up. No transparency. Just erased.

Douglass Park Shooting: The Manufactured Villain

Three days earlier, June 26, 55-year-old veteran Charles Leto shot two teenagers near Douglass Park, killing 15-year-old Marjay Dotson. CPD’s first statement? That Leto “approached a group of males.” The shooter was framed as the aggressor.

But surveillance footage later proved the opposite: the teens approached Leto.There’s also unreleased video of am earlier incident with Leto and body cam footage of officers on the scene — but don’t hold your breath for that.

Same pattern: CPD leads with a politically convenient narrative, then walks it back once the facts leak out.

Victims Refusing to Press Charges — the Stat That Disappears

Then there’s the armed robbery downtown near the Palmer House on June 21. Four suspects — part of a crew running through the Loop with pistols — were detained after reports of multiple robberies.

A weapon was recovered. The suspects were caught. One fled with a red backpack. But here’s the kicker:

The victim refused to press charges.

Despite armed suspects, police chases, and a gun recovered in the heart of downtown, the case is now a limp footnote — one more felony downgraded, one more crime that won’t make it into the “index.”

This isn’t rare.

Victims — especially tourists, gig workers, or street vendors — are often reluctant to go through the system. Fear of retaliation, lack of trust, or simply wanting to go home and forget it happened.

But the city benefits from their silence.

No charges? No problem.

No stat.

ShotSpotter Gone, Victim Left Waiting

And then there’s the ultimate breakdown: a murder victim left unfound for 16 minutes because of an incorrect 911 address and the deactivation of ShotSpotter in the area.

According to a CWBChicago report published June 28, Chicago police and paramedics needed 16 minutes to find a woman who was shot in Washington Park on Friday night because the only 911 caller to report the crime gave police an incorrect address, dispatch records show.

The incident, which occurred in the 5400 block of South Prairie, unfolded in an area previously covered by the city’s ShotSpotter gunfire detection system, which Mayor Brandon Johnson deactivated last September.

The sensors that once alerted police to gunfire in real time? Removed.

This is what happens when ideology replaces infrastructure.

So What Do the Numbers Really Mean?

When CPD says murder is “down 31%,” or car theft is “only up 4%,” what does that really mean?

How many crimes are reclassified as “not bona fide”?

How many violent incidents disappear when victims stop cooperating?

How many bodies are found late because the city killed the tech that used to find them?

Sexual assaults are statistically flat this year — 811 vs. 812 — but when a group assault in Lakeview is buried within 12 hours, it’s clear how that number stays flat.

Motor vehicle theft? Still surging. Up 67% since 2021.

No answers. No urgency. No spotlight.

Chicago may have fewer murders than in 2021 — but don’t confuse that with progress. This is a game of statistical shell games and narrative control, not public safety.

The numbers may be dropping, but so is public trust. And once that’s gone, no spreadsheet will fix what’s coming.

Pride Weekend Tally: Less Blood

According to HeyJackass, this year’s Pride Weekend ended with:

5 killed, 18 wounded

It’s the lowest tally in at least a decade, but here’s the full context:

2024: 8 killed, 26 wounded

2023: 7 killed, 34 wounded

2021: 12 killed, 68 wounded

2020: 20 killed, 47 wounded

This isn’t victory. It’s stabilization after a structural failure.

The same way a house fire looks “better” once the flames are out, but the place is still ashes.

The violence didn’t vanish. It just moved, morphed, or was reclassified.

A Culture That Doesn’t Believe in Measurement

Let’s not forget: the man at the top — Mayor Brandon Johnson — was elected by the Chicago Teachers Union, which has spent years publicly denouncing the use of standardized testing and data-driven accountability.

“Testing doesn’t reflect learning.”
“Testing is racist.”
“Data is oppression.”

That’s the ideological core of Johnson’s political base.

CTU President Stacy Davis Gates has openly claimed standardized testing is “rooted in white supremacy.” Fox 11, 2023

The union’s official stance calls for minimizing testing, even going so far as to call it “punitive” and harmful to students and educators. CTU Position on Testing

So it should come as no surprise that under Johnson, crime data — just like academic data — becomes political theater.

Numbers only matter when they help the narrative. When they don’t, they’re erased, reclassified, or ignored.

This is a city run by people who don’t believe in measurement, now asking us to trust their crime stats.

That’s not governance. That’s propaganda.

References

Chicago Police CompStat Report (Week Ending 22 June 2025)
https://www.chicagopolice.org/wp-content/uploads/1_PDFsam_CompStat-Public-2025-Week-25.pdf

Lakeview Sexual Assault Report and Retraction (29–30 June 2025)
Douglass Park Shooting and Charles Leto Case – CPD Initial vs. Video Evidence (26–29 June 2025)
https://x.com/SubxNews/status/1939749348167819346

Downtown Armed Robbery, Victim Refuses to Press Charges (21 June 2025)
https://x.com/SubxNews/status/1936543573119549449
https://x.com/SubxNews/status/1936546987198820416
https://x.com/SubxNews/status/1936550372329365884
https://x.com/SubxNews/status/1936552062055047395

CWBChicago – “16 Minutes to Find Murder Victim…” (28 June 2025)
https://cwbchicago.com/2025/06/16-minutes-to-find-murder-victim-due-to-incorrect-911-address-and-deactivated-shotspotter.html

HeyJackass – Pride Weekend Stupidity (30 June 2025)
https://heyjackass.com/enlightening-commentary/pride-weekend-stupidity-10/

Don’t let CPS push their tests on you and your students! https://www.ctulocal1.org/rights/concerns/workload/testing/

Systemic Test Racism in Chicago Chicago Teachers Union President Stacy Davis Gates says black students can’t succeed on tests Aug. 15, 2024 https://www.wsj.com/opinion/chicago-schools-testing-stacy-davis-gates-teachers-union-c147d0f3

Chicago Teachers Union president claims standardized testing ‘rooted in White supremacy’ August 20th 2024 https://fox11online.com/news/nation-world/chicago-teachers-union-president-claims-standardized-testing-rooted-in-white-supremacy-stacy-davis-gates-students-education-chicago-public-schools-illinois-crisis-in-the-classroom