1,300 Extra Cops To Be Deployed For Historically Violent Labor Day Weekend

By Stephen Gossett in News on Sep 1, 2017 6:39PM

Photo: Scott Olson / Getty Images

Local law enforcement is bracing for the long holiday weekend. An additional 1,300 officers will be deployed across the city over the three-day weekend, the Chicago Police Department announced on Friday.

Like some other warm-weather holiday weekends, last year's Labor Day stretch in Chicago proved notably bloody. Sixty-five people were shot over the Labor Day weekend in 2016, 13 of them fatally. That violent leg pushed the number of homicides beyond the 500 mark.

This year however is a bit of a different story compared to last year's overall numbers. After the record violence of 2016 first spilled into the new year, shootings and homicides then took a dip. Homicides have fallen from 475 to 452 through Sunday, and shootings are way down: 1,930 this year, compared to 2,289 this time in 2016, according to the Tribune.

Police arrested 90 people as part of its six-week strategy ahead of the Labor Day weekend.