ST. LOUIS — Late Tuesday night, Michael Puckett was found shot to death in an alley near his Carondelet home. His death marks the 222nd carjacking since January 2018.
When you look at the numbers, carjackings are happening in neighborhoods across the city. There have been 12 this year in Hyde Park, 11 in Baden. The popular Central West End neighborhood has seen eight.
In Carondelet, counting Puckett's murder, there have been nine. That number has neighbors on edge.
"Yea it was sad, it was very sad," said Dee Brown, a longtime Carondelet resident.
She said this crime has caused many of her neighbors to consider moving.
"People are afraid, and they’re tired of the crime," she said.
Months ago, Brown scheduled Chief Hayden to speak for a meeting of the St. Louis Safety Group. She calls the timing of the crime with his appearance as merely serendipitous.
A standing room only crowd packed into the library and peppered Chief John Hayden with questions.
“I think it’s giving at least some of us the sense that things are getting out of control," said one woman in the crowd.
Chief Hayden told 5 On Your Side, he's devastated that Michael Puckett lost his life.
"Very tragic, very unfortunate. And we’re going to work very diligently to bring that to its proper conclusion," said Chief Hayden.
He says he plans to continue to focus on North City crime in the so-called Hayden's rectangle first.
"Places that have seen some type of crime, we’ll focus on that next, so we can get all crime down," he said.
According to him, it's working.
Homicides are down 25 percent in Hayden's Rectangle, but the Chief admits, that doesn't matter if people don't feel safer.
"We still have a lot of work to do. I want people to feel safe and feel confident to come out," said Hayden.
Hayden said when it comes to carjackings, he's created a regional taskforce consisting of police forces on both sides of the Mississippi, along with state and federal agencies.
"We noticed there was an uptick in carjackings, so we did form a carjacking task force. They meet a couple times a month, but they also can meet more often when the need arises," he said.
Strong words, but Dee Brown says, she and everyone else wants to see results.
"Really what happens in one neighborhood effects all of us," said Brown.
Chief Hayden says another big problem the city is facing is that many people won't assist police officers in their investigation.
That makes prosecuting these cases that much harder.
