ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — New crime statistics released by the St. Petersburg Police Department show a dramatic drop in homicides last year in St. Petersburg. 

Willie Davis, who's 23-year-old son Artez was killed during a shooting in October of 2019, has been waiting years to hear that kind of news.

“He was looking to make it as a rapper,” Davis said. “He loved to rap. He was always rapping…rapping about everything around the house. He’d rap about conflict.”

If he's not talking about his son, then he's talking about his sons children. Davis said life hasn't been the same since.

“Tez had two kids,” he said. “I tell you he loved his family. Just remembering him as being so young and still had a lot of life to live and his little girls, y’know the two girls — it’s hard at times I think about him.”

Davis, like so many other parents who’ve lost children to deadly violence, vow to do anything and everything in their children’s memory to prevent another family from going through what they're going through.

Apparently their work is paying off in St. Petersburg as there where homicide deaths halved in 2022 compared to the year prior. 16 homicides took place in 2022, while there were 33 in 2021. With the exception of a teen who was killed last month, the last youth gang related deaths happened in 2015.

“That gives me hope," Davis said. “That’s saying that we can live and that we can be safe in our communities.”

Police also give credit to their narcotics task force and technology that listens for gunfire helping them to respond faster, saving lives and that's leaving police and people like Willie looking forward to reducing crime even more in 2023.