{"id":104442,"date":"2026-01-19T07:04:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-19T07:04:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/104442\/"},"modified":"2026-01-19T07:04:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-19T07:04:10","slug":"st-johns-county-made-it-through-2025-without-one-homicide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/104442\/","title":{"rendered":"St. John&#8217;s County made it through 2025 without one homicide"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A major Florida county made it through 2025 without a single homicide.<\/p>\n<p>St. Johns County, which houses the historic city of St. Augustine and boasts a population of more than 300,000, is the only county among the 100 largest in the US without recording a criminal homicide, according to a<a href=\"https:\/\/sjcitizen.com\/st-johns-county-notched-this-nearly-unthinkable-public-safety-milestone-in-2025-were-blessed\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"> report by the St. Johns Citizen<\/a> last week.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSometimes you whisper accomplishments because you don\u2019t want to take them for granted,\u201d county Sheriff Robert Hardwick told the outlet. \u201cWe\u2019re truly blessed.<\/p>\n<p>St. Johns County Sheriff Robert Hardwick said support from county leaders has helped keep residents safe. Lucia Viti\/The Record \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s no single reason for a year like this. It\u2019s cumulative \u2014 a lot of variables.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>St. Johns did report two fatal shootings \u2014 both officer-involved shootings that were ruled justified and therefore not classified as criminal homicides, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.firstcoastnews.com\/article\/news\/local\/st-johns-county-records-zero-homicides-in-2025\/77-4c09cb05-1dd9-4edc-935d-21cfdd050e14\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">First Coast News said<\/a> in a separate report.<\/p>\n<p>Hardwick, who said there also was just one criminal homicide in the county in 2024, credited city officials with providing his department with the help, training and funding required to keep locals safe, with nearly 80% of the sheriff\u2019s office budget going to salaries and benefits.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI honestly go back to our commissioners approving our budget and allowing me to invest in technology, allowing me to invest in our agency members and their equipment,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n<p>St. Johns includes St. Augustine, one the oldest cities in the US. Visit Florida<\/p>\n<p>Hardwick, here at a community event, said there were no criminal homicides on his watch all of last year. Lucia Viti\/The Record \/ USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt goes back to the community believing in us, not being afraid to call when something suspicious occurs, Hardwick said. \u201cIf they see something, they say something, and they let us do our job.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The sheriff acknowledged there is still work to do, with domestic-violence cases and violations of orders of protection up last year \u2014 meaning it will take plenty of focus to keep the zero homicide streak going.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe had a great year \u2014 and a lucky one,\u201d he told the St. Johns Citizen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A major Florida county made it through 2025 without a single homicide. St. Johns County, which houses the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104443,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[303,3640,1027,238,9,11,10,31834,58],"class_list":{"0":"post-104442","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-crime","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-homicide","11":"tag-murders","12":"tag-new-york","13":"tag-new-york-headlines","14":"tag-new-york-news","15":"tag-statistics","16":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104442","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104442"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104442\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104443"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104442"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104442"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104442"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}