Pittsburgh homicides jump 28% as other cities see declines

Bad news.

Pittsburgh homicides jump 28% as other cities see declines The number is unofficial and could fall to 73 when the bureau reclassifies some deaths as accidental or justifiable, including three police-involved shootings. But even the lower figure makes 2008 the city's bloodiest year since 1993, when there were 83 homicides. The number also represents a 28 percent increase from 2007, when the city recorded 57 homicides.

The bureau's clearance rate for homicides -- those where an arrest was made or a case was otherwise solved -- went down from 75 percent in 2007 to about 49 percent for 2008.

Allegheny County as a whole had 120 murders in 2008, up from 98. The record, 125, was set in 2003.