this has been the deadliest year ever. philadelphia alone 523 homicide breaking a record that stood for over 30 years. and too many agonizing moments to count what will you miss most about her samir always smiles samir, like he makes me happy he cheers me up. reporter: she still speaks about her 14-year-old son as if he s still here. but as the high school freshman waited for a bus last week he was killed police say two people got out of a car, chased him across the street and then fired about 35 shots these are some of the bullet holes still on the side of this pharmacy samir was hit 18 times. the people that killed samir ain t killers. they monsters. like they shot my son 18 times reporter: among the cities already setting records for murder this year, portland, tucson, toledo, austin saint paul and albuquerque. the debate over why is raging some experts blame the pandemic in part their reform keeping more criminals out of
jail more guns and fewer officers indianapolis also hitting an all-time homicide high. we re definitely recruiting i want to put those officers on the streets. reporter: philadelphia district attorney larry krasner argues that while homicide are up in his city, other crimes like rape and robberies that don t involve a gun are down. we don t have a crisis of lawlessness. we don t have a crisis of crime we don t have a crisis of violence. reporter: but former mayor michael nutter is slamming those comments as white privilege saying the progressive da has not been tough enough on criminals and demanding krasner apologize to families like desiree my son is not coming back. i don t care about no justice. none of that brings samir back none of it. none of it. reporter: police here have arrested two suspects in connection to her son s murder. tonight two more are still on the run, lester. reporter: all right. gabe gutierrez thank you. and convicted murderer scott peterson was