Kansas City Police Chief Stacey Graves, addressing the first of several press conferences following a shooting at the Chiefs Super Bowl parade Wednesday, paused for a second as her handlers tried to get her to end the update. She had one more thing to say.
“This is not Kansas City,” Graves said. “I am angered by what happened.”
In fact, gun violence is very Kansas City.
Graves’ first year as chief coincided with the city’s deadliest on record, with 185 homicides in 2023. Kansas City is an outlier to many U.S. cities, where murders decreased by nearly 10% in the first half of 2023, data that is also reflected by the FBI.
Tommy Simmons, whose 33-year-old son Ahmad Simmons was killed last year, heard Graves’ remark and wondered.
“I thought, ‘Where we at then? Somewhere in the Wizard of Oz in Kansas?'” Simmons said Thursday.
The majority of homicides in 2023 were blamed on firearms. Overwhelmingly, Black males were suspects and victims. As of Friday morning, Kansas City police had logged 15 homicides, including the death at Union Station. As is the case every year, the most common motive behind this year's homicides is an “argument.”
An argument — Graves characterized it as “a dispute” — is apparently the reason behind Wednesday’s shooting, which so far has left one person dead and 22 people wounded, according to police.
On Friday morning, the Jackson County Office of the Juvenile Officer announced it had charged two people under 18 with gun offenses and resisting arrest in connection with the shooting. Officials have not released their names because they are juveniles.
When asked Thursday about her comments a day earlier about what Kansas City is or isn’t, Graves acknowledged that Kansas City has a problem with gun violence, but she pointed to the parade as her definition.
Graves said she didn't want to "minimize" Wednesday's shooting, but she noted that an estimated one million people had come together for a celebration. "Again, you have just a handful … that perpetrated the violence that played out," she said.
Graves was still emotional on Thursday during the third press conference since the shooting, and she faltered when confirming the death of 43-year-old Lisa Lopez-Galvan, saying the department is “working tirelessly to investigate her murder.”
Mayor Quinton Lucas, who was with Graves at the press conference, took up the “This is not Kansas City” question. He reminded reporters that last year’s Super Bowl parade did not attract this violence, and there were no arrests during the Royals World Series rally in 2015.
“So I don't think in any way that this is Kansas City. I do think that there is a gun violence challenge in this community and many others,” Lucas said. “And there certainly is a gun violence challenge as it relates to major events. That, however, does not mean that Kansas City will stop having major events.”
Kansas City’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade, set for March 17 in Westport, is still being planned and the city won’t be putting a stop to public parades and gatherings because of Wednesday’s shootings, Lucas said.
“Certainly we recognize the public safety challenges at issue that relate to them,” he said. “This is why we have detectives right now who are doing important work to make sure the people who committed these offenses are brought to justice.”
