Editor’s note: The Modesto Bee uses the legal definition of homicide to mean the slaying or killing of one person by another. By that definition, it includes officer-involved deaths, of which there was one in 2025.
Aside from the death of a suspect during an exchange of gunfire in March, Modesto had zero homicides in 2025. It’s a milestone unlikely shared by any other city of its size in the United States, based on The Bee’s initial findings.
The news is a far cry from headlines of violence prominent in the city for over two decades. In 2015, the city was the fifth-most violent in California, with 25 homicides…