St. Louis, Missouri, closed out 2020 with its highest homicide rate in five decades. The city recorded 267 slayings last year, or 87 per 100,000 residents; the last time it was that high was 1970. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch notes that the homicide rate has risen each year for the last six but that experts think the various stressors of the COVID-19 pandemic fueled an even bigger surge. “St. Louis sees a similar spike that we saw elsewhere, but what’s different is its starting level was already so high,” Richard Rosenfeld, a criminology professor at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, told the paper.