Year of gun violence puts Tulsa 1 homicide away from record

TULSA, Okla. (AP) – With five weeks to go before the end of 2016, Tulsa is in a position to record its highest number of fatalities in a year.
Tulsa has logged 71 homicides this year, tying a record set in 2009. That year, a spike in gang activity was to blame for a majority of the killings.
Although handguns were used in about three-fourths of this year’s killings, detectives say they’re unable to find a unifying reason for the homicides as they have in past years, when gangs or drugs were to blame.
The city of about 400,000 averages between 54-58 homicides a year. The tally’s been as low as 48 recently.
Police say homicides have occurred in every geographic area in the city, rather than a particular high-crime or drug-prone area.