How Birmingham Broke a Nearly Century-Old Homicide Record in 2024

By Alaina Bookman and Cody D. Short | AL.com This is another installment in The Birmingham Times/AL.com/CBS42 joint series, “Beyond the Violence  Click here to sign up for the newsletter. Rope. Dynamite. Guns. And more guns. In 1933, Birmingham, then a young city founded on railroads and coal mines, counted 148 homicides, as men, so far as we know, killed each other with all manner of weapons. Some while drinking, others while fighting, others caught up in others’ arguments. On Wednesday, Birmingham broke that nearly century-old record, as police responded to the 149th homicide of 2024, finding a man shot to death in the front yard of a home in Titusville. Birmingham stands out among other cities in the state, and country, for its dramatic increase in homicides in recent years. The city recorded multiple mass shootings in 2024. Instead of one or two bullet casings at a scene, police sometimes documented hundreds. Some people were killed after alleged kidnappings and torture. Officials pleaded for peace. The killings continued. “If we had one homicide in our city, that would be too many,” Mayor Randall Woodfin told AL.com on Tuesday. “If we had two, that would be too many. If we...