Despite ending 2024 with a decline in homicides, Oakland marked the start of 2025 with a surge in violence, including multiple fatal shootings on New Year’s Eve and early New Year’s Day.
Two people were killed in two separate shootings during the overnight hours. Large groups also took to the streets during a sideshow.
Jalen Wesley called the incidents a bitter start to 2025.
“It’s New Year’s and someone’s family is mourning mother, sister, brother, daughter,” Wesley said.
Wesley is an Oakland resident who lives downtown, not far from the scene of last night’s shooting.
An OPD spokesperson said gunfire sent three people to the hospital and left one person dead on 2nd Street near Jack London Square.
This happened just hours before another shooting on 24th Avenue left a 32-year-old man dead, marking the first homicide of the year.
Wesley told CBS News Bay Area he was disappointed.
“There are two sides of Oakland,” he said. “And I feel like sometimes the crime overpowers what Oakland really is.”
These shootings happen just days after just the day after city leaders touted a decline in homicides by 2024.
At a news conference, officials said homicides have fallen by more than 30%, a significant drop from 2023.
After the New Year’s Eve shootings, 2024 ended the year with more than 80 homicides.
Carrol Fife, council member for District 3, said she was saddened by the violence, but doesn’t think the violence means the city isn’t recovering.
“We have the right systems in place to move Oakland in the right direction,” Fife said. “And that’s what’s encouraging about how we’re getting to a point where the homicide rate is zero.”
Wesley says the sour start to the year doesn’t mean 2025 has to follow the same trends. The new leadership gives him hope.
“There’s a new police chief, and as far as they settle in with the new mayor, I hope to see some new changes in the situation where criminals don’t feel comfortable here,” he said.
