-Getting a call from someone in the 2900 block at Gladstone,
states that you need to come to a grey house
that has the door standing open in the 2900 block of Gladstone.
Believe someone's laying on the floor inside the house.
-[Speaking indistinctly] right there.
Somebody's probably shot.
-Unit [speaking indistinctly]
, my caller wanted to remain anonymous
and said you're at the right place.
-On the northeast side of Indianapolis,
officers respond to shots fired on Gladstone Avenue.
A suspected drug deal has ended in a shootout.
-It looks like they were meeting up right here,
right in front, where we were standing.
And then something went wrong,
and started shooting back and forth at each other.
Some people got in a car and fled, some people ran westbound,
and then some people ran eastbound.
-Didn't we find --
Hey, wasn't this where the homicide was last year?
Remember, there was a dead guy laying in there?
-Seven people have been shot dead on the street
in the last four years.
Six of those cases remain unsolved.
24-year-old Alexander Brown was one of those victims.
He was last seen at this house with a friend.
-911, what is the location of your emergency?
-Police at 3025, please. -Okay, 3025.
-Please, please, [speaking indistinctly]!
-Ma'am, you gotta take a slow breath.
-East Gladstone.
My boyfriend has been missing.
This is the last house he was at.
The house got blood all in it.
-Okay, do you -- -Bullet holes and everything.
-Ma'am, you've gotta take a breath for me.
Do you see your boyfriend?
-Please!
-Ma'am, do you see your boyfriend?
-No!
-After organizing a search party,
his family found his body.
-Right here.
Their bodies was just thrown out here.
And our other sister, she found the bodies.
And they brought the bodies here,
dumped the bodies here, in this lot.
And that's what it says on his death certificate, this lot.
This address of this lot is where he was found.
-Brown had a new job, and his girlfriend was pregnant.
His family said he was turning his life around
after serving time for armed robbery.
-We -- Should nobody have to go through that.
Your children are supposed to bury you.
You are not supposed to bury your children.
You know?
-"The Washington Post" has compiled and analyzed
a decade's worth of data
on over 50,000 killings in 50 of America's largest cities.
In 33 of those cities, "The Post " found pockets of impunity --
areas like Gladstone Avenue in Indianapolis,
where at least nine murders have been committed,
and fewer than 33% of those cases led to arrests.
-It seems like it's just yesterday to me,
and it's been over a year already.
It just -- It's hard.
-Brown's father, Bruce Jones,
grew up in this part of the city.
-They called me at work and said that,
"They found your son dead."
Said his friend had done robbed someone or something,
and the guy put a hit on him.
And my son was just with him all the time.
He was just --
They said he was like collateral damage or whatnot.
-At police headquarters, homicide detective
Marcus Kennedy describes
how the department keeps track of the city's murders.
-Yeah, they're here in the book.
It lists what number it is,
and it's a double-case number, their home address at the time.
And it shows it's unsolved and who the detective is.
If it's a solved case or a motive is known,
it's listed here in the book.
But that one is blank 'cause it's unsolved.
And homicide 121 and 122 for the year of 2016.
No detective wants to carry a case that's unsolved.
It weighs on you, you know,
'cause you keep getting cases behind it.
And if something comes up on an old case,
we're trying to work that in.
I mean, I never used to keep a to-do list,
but I have to keep a to-do list now
because you got stuff, like I said, in court going on.
You're trying to do stuff for that,
and you're catching new cases and death investigations.
It's just a lot going on right now.
All of us are actually actively working two
or three murders right now.
I'd say probably 85%, 90% of it
is drug-related in some kind of way.
You get retaliation shootings every now and then,
but it's not that often.
And usually, you've heard something
about it ahead of time.
But drugs seem to be the motive now.
Here in Homicide, we depend on witnesses and cooperation
from the community.
And if we don't get that cooperation from the community,
it makes your job that much harder.
-In northeast Indianapolis, families of those killed
have resorted to buying billboards
to search for answers.
The number of killings
and the lack of arrests breed resentment.
Residents complain there aren't enough cops in the beat.
-A white Chevy Impala.
-And that the largely-white police force
is out of touch with their problems.
Some tell us they think detectives look the other way
when people like Alexander Brown are killed --
that if you're a young black man with a criminal record,
your life isn't worth as much.
-I've heard it out there myself, and I'm saying,
"Okay, you got a black male that was killed by a black male,
and I'm a black detective.
So what's my motivation for not doing anything?"
And of all the years I've been up here,
I've never heard one detective even say,
"Oh, it's just a black guy. I'm not gonna do anything."
It just doesn't happen. That's a myth.
-City officials are impatient with the rising
number of homicides. -Yes.
So, this is a neighborhood that we've paid
a lot of attention to.
-Last year, they tapped Bryan Roach
as their next Chief of Police.
-Indianapolis, unfortunately,
has been on the map for homicides.
We've seen a steady increase since about 2012 --
a significant increase.
There are certain areas of our community that are under-served
in many ways,
that where we struggle in getting someone to say,
"Yeah, I saw it and I'm willing to testify"
because they may not see -- it doesn't feel safe to them.
In other areas of the city, I think it does.
The feeling I get now is almost --
I think "accepted" is too harsh of a word.
But they feel like it's part of life, and it shouldn't be.
And I think to own this is on us and the community
to say that that's not normal, right?
in our community, that is not normal
and that should not happen.
And what is it we're gonna do to fix that?
And law enforcement is just a piece of it.
-The Chief also recognizes the lack of diversity
in his department.
-There's an expectation that their police department
or those public servants
to look like a representative of the people that they serve.
Marion County is about -- if we just pick African-American,
Marion County is 28%.
Our police department is 14%.
So right off the bat, we don't look like the community
that we serve in that area.
-Hi, ma'am. -Hi.
-License and registration, please.
-There's a lack of trust on both sides.
Police say they need help from the community.
People here say they need the police
to protect witnesses and arrest the culprits.
-When you grow up around, you know, that stuff,
it's like normal
'cause it's an everyday occurrence or whatnot.
You just stay in your lane, you know?
You see it, you keep going, you keep your mouth
shut and whatnot.
You just look out for your own.
The guys could be affiliated
with, you know, guys that get killed.
They want some revenge-type stuff to where they like,
"I wanna catch them before the police do."
You know, being honest.
So they really don't want the police to get them.
They wanna go get them their selves.
But, you know, that's their way of thinking.
And, you know, they been --
that's what they grew up knowing.
And that's all they know.
-Once voted the safest small town in America,
Zionsville police tonight
are investigating a murder there this evening.
-At least one person suspected of being connected
to Brown's murder was gunned down in 2017.
according to local media reports.
Brown's mother wants answers.
She says she's waited long enough.
-Once you an ex-convict or whatever,
they really don't care.
No, that is somebody's son. He is my son.
You need to find out what happened and who did it
and why it happened.
It doesn't matter where he comes from.
Your job is to solve homicides,
and that's what you need to be doing.
No matter where it happens, that's your job.
Do it, plain and simple.
That's how I feel about it.
That's exactly how I feel.