Three hundred and ten. That was the count on MPD’s crime data hub as of December 3. By the time you read this, the number will be higher. Memphis is not just going to break its homicide record in 2021. It’s going to obliterate it.
The previous record was 332, set just last year. Before that, the city had recorded 228 homicides in 2016, which felt staggering at the time. Now 228 sounds like a number Memphis would celebrate. We’re past 310 with nearly four weeks left in the year, and the pace hasn’t slowed. Some projections put the final count near 340 or higher.
For anyone working in security, property management, or commercial real estate in this city, these numbers aren’t abstract. They translate directly into phone calls, contract negotiations, and budget meetings happening right now across Shelby County.
Where the Violence Concentrates
Homicides in Memphis don’t distribute evenly across the map. They cluster, and the clustering in 2021 has been severe.
Frayser, zip code 38127, leads the city again. The neighborhood north of I-40 and west of Thomas Street has recorded more than 30 homicides this year. Drive the stretch of North Watkins from Frayser Boulevard down to Whitney Avenue on any given evening, and the tension is visible: boarded storefronts, vacant lots where houses used to stand, and the occasional patrol car parked in a gas station lot.
Whitehaven, 38116, runs second. The area around Shelby Drive and Elvis Presley Boulevard has seen a steady drumbeat of shootings throughout the year, many of them at or near apartment complexes. Property managers in Whitehaven have been scrambling to add security since summer, and several have told me they can’t find companies willing to staff armed posts at the rates they can afford.
Hickory Hill, 38115, sits right behind. The corridor along Winchester Road from Riverdale to Hacks Cross has always had property crime issues, going back decades. What’s different this year is the frequency of gun violence at retail locations and in apartment parking lots. A shooting at a gas station near Ridgeway and Winchester in October sent three people to the hospital and prompted the property owner to hire 24-hour armed security for the first time.
Raleigh, 38128, rounds out the top four. The area around Austin Peay Highway has dealt with carjackings and armed robberies that spiked dramatically in the second half of 2021. MPD’s Raleigh precinct reported more carjacking incidents between July and November than in all of 2020.
What Went Wrong in 2021
Assigning a single cause to 310-plus murders is lazy and wrong. Multiple factors converged this year to produce the worst violence Memphis has seen in its modern history.
Gun availability tops the list. MPD has seized over 8,000 firearms in 2021, a record pace. Despite those seizures, the supply of guns on Memphis streets appears functionally unlimited. Officers describe pulling weapons from traffic stops, foot chases, and domestic calls at rates they’ve never seen. The guns are cheap, often stolen, and everywhere.
Domestic violence accounts for a significant share of the killings. Shelby County’s family safety center has reported increased caseloads throughout the year, and multiple homicides this fall involved intimate partners or family members. These killings rarely make headlines the way a drive-by shooting does, yet they constitute roughly 15 to 20 percent of Memphis homicides in a typical year.
Youth violence has been especially grim. Victims and suspects under 25 account for a disproportionate share of the year’s cases. Several shootings involved teenagers, including incidents near schools and community centers that drew brief media attention before being displaced by the next shooting.
Drug-related killings continue at a steady pace. The fentanyl trade, in particular, has introduced a level of volatility that older distribution networks didn’t produce. Disputes over territory, debts, and supply chain disruptions have resulted in retaliatory cycles that MPD’s homicide unit struggles to interrupt.
The Carjacking Surge
Carjackings deserve separate attention because the spike in 2021 has been dramatic enough to change how Memphis residents think about everyday activities.
MPD data shows carjacking reports more than doubled compared to 2019 levels. The incidents concentrate in parking lots (grocery stores, gas stations, strip malls) and residential driveways, with the heaviest activity in South Memphis, Whitehaven, and Orange Mound. Suspects are frequently young, often juveniles, and the stolen vehicles turn up within 24 to 48 hours, typically abandoned or used in subsequent crimes.
For the security industry, carjackings have created a new category of demand. Parking lot security, once considered a commodity service handled by minimum-wage unarmed guards, has become an armed assignment in many parts of the city. Retailers along Poplar Avenue and in the Wolfchase area have added uniformed officers specifically to patrol parking areas during peak hours. The Kroger on Union Avenue hired a security company for its parking lot after two carjacking attempts in three weeks this fall.
The cost of responding to carjackings falls partly on businesses that had never budgeted for security. A small restaurant owner on Summer Avenue told me he’s spending $1,200 a month for an armed officer to stand in his parking lot from 5 p.m. to closing because three customers were robbed in September and his business dropped 30 percent overnight.
“I can’t afford the guard,” he said. “I can’t afford not to have one either.”
Property Crime Heading Into Winter
While homicides grab headlines, property crime patterns heading into winter create their own set of problems for security providers and their clients.
Burglaries typically increase in December and January as shorter daylight hours provide more cover. This year, the pattern is compounding with supply chain issues that have filled warehouses and distribution centers with high-value inventory while leaving them short-staffed. Several logistics facilities near the Memphis International Airport have expanded security coverage ahead of the holiday season, citing both the value of goods on-site and the difficulty of monitoring large perimeters with reduced staff.
Catalytic converter theft, which was barely a blip in 2019, has become a constant headache for fleet operators and apartment complexes across the city. The price of rhodium and palladium has driven organized theft rings to target parking lots at churches, apartment complexes, and office buildings. A single catalytic converter from a Toyota Prius or Honda CR-V can sell for $800 to $1,500 at a scrap yard, making the crime highly profitable relative to the risk.
Package theft from doorsteps and apartment mail rooms peaks every December, and 2021 will be no exception given the continued growth in online shopping. Apartment managers in Cordova and Bartlett have installed additional cameras and hired temporary security staff for the month.
What This Means for Private Security Demand in 2022
Here’s the bottom line for security companies and their clients: every trend line points toward higher demand and higher costs in 2022.
The homicide record will reset public perception of Memphis’s safety. National news coverage of the city’s violence has already made hiring and retention harder for Memphis employers across every industry. Businesses that never considered private security are now requesting proposals. Property managers who cut security budgets during COVID are restoring them and then some.
This demand surge is hitting an industry that already can’t find enough workers. Armed guard positions in Memphis are going unfilled for weeks. Companies are poaching officers from competitors with signing bonuses and wage increases that would have been unthinkable two years ago. The going rate for an armed officer on a commercial post in Shelby County has climbed from $14 to $15 per hour in late 2019 to $17 to $20 today, and some specialized posts are paying more.
For clients, the math is straightforward and unpleasant. Security contracts will cost more in 2022. Companies that locked in multi-year rates in 2019 or 2020 will face significant increases at renewal. The days of getting armed patrol service in Memphis for $18 to $20 per billable hour are ending. Expect $22 to $28 depending on the assignment and the neighborhood.
For security companies, the opportunity is real and the risk is just as real. Firms that grow too fast without adequate supervision and training will have incidents. Incidents at this volume of operations, in neighborhoods with this level of violence, won’t be small. The companies that survive the growth wave will be the ones that hire carefully, train properly, and don’t take contracts they can’t staff safely.
How Property Managers Are Responding
I spoke with property managers and business owners in all four of the hardest-hit zip codes over the past two weeks. The responses fall into three categories.
The first group has invested heavily. One apartment complex owner in Frayser spent $85,000 this year on security upgrades including new cameras, fencing, improved lighting, and a contract with an armed patrol company. Occupancy at the property is up 6 percent since the improvements, which he credits to word-of-mouth among tenants who feel safer.
The second group is doing the minimum. These tend to be small landlords with one or two properties who hire a single unarmed guard for overnight shifts and hope the visible presence deters crime. The results are mixed. An unarmed officer at an apartment complex in Hickory Hill told me he’s been threatened twice this year and that several residents have told him directly that his presence doesn’t make them feel any safer because everyone knows he’s unarmed.
The third group has done nothing. Some property owners in high-crime areas have decided that the cost of security exceeds any potential return and that insurance will cover losses. This is a risky calculation. Insurance premiums are rising too, and carriers are beginning to scrutinize whether property owners in high-crime areas are taking reasonable steps to prevent foreseeable harm. A property owner who skips security and then faces a premises liability lawsuit after a tenant is assaulted will wish they’d spent the money.
Looking at 2022 Through Honest Eyes
Memphis will enter 2022 with a homicide count that would have seemed impossible five years ago. The violence is concentrated, predictable in its geography if not its individual incidents, and deeply connected to economic conditions that aren’t changing anytime soon.
The private security industry in Memphis will be busier than it has ever been. Whether that translates into a better-protected city or simply more guards standing in more parking lots depends on choices being made right now, in December, by company owners writing proposals and property managers signing contracts.
Those 310-plus families who buried someone this year don’t care about industry growth metrics. They care about whether the parking lot, the apartment complex, or the street corner where their person died is any safer tonight than it was yesterday. That’s the only question that matters heading into the new year.