THUNDER BAY — Thunder Bay police officers laid 226 more criminal charges in 2024 than the previous year, new data released by the force shows.
The 8.6 per cent increase was in large part due to significant hike in the number of drug-related charges, which more than doubled.
Statistics provided to Newswatch by the police service showed in 2024 that 217 people were charged criminally with 589 drug-related offences compared to 114 people facing 252 criminal charges in 2023.
Charges in most other categories of crime varied up or down by much smaller margins.
“It hasn't gone up dramatically, but it has increased — again, just the activity that we're seeing in the community and things that we're trying to stay on top of,” said police chief Darcy Fleury.
“It's a bit concerning, but it's just a call for us to continue with our enforcement priorities and focus on those directions.”
The crime statistics for 2024 were included in the police service’s annual report, which was presented to the Thunder Bay Police Service Board on Tuesday. In all, police charged 2,865 people in 2024, compared to 2,639 the previous year. That included 244 young people charged, up from 215 in 2023.
In terms of individual offences, theft-related charges increased across the board in 2024 compared to the year prior, including robbery, or thefts involving a weapon (up to 266 from 210), theft under $5,000 (up to 2,543 from 2,005), shoplifting (up to 1,623 from 1,176) and, in the biggest increase, theft from a vehicle, with 423 such charges in 2024, compared to 283 the previous year.
Charges for property-related crimes also rose to 4,290 from 3,993 in 2023.
Not all categories saw increases. The number of assault charges dropped to 1,450 in 2024 after sitting at 1,504 in 2023. Charges related to sexual assault or other sexual offences likewise dropped to 188 from 2023’s 224 statistic.
The big jump in drug charges was accompanied by a big jump in the value of drugs seized by police.
During her presentation to the board, Tracie Smith, the police service’s director of corporate communications, said the total estimated street value of drugs seized in 2024 was over $7.25 million, drastically up from about $3.25 million in 2023.
“Some of this is due to Project Marble, which resulted in our service's largest single seizure of cocaine in 2024,” Smith told board members. Project marble alone accounted for over $3 million, police officials said, when announcing the results of the operation in February 2024.
“That's a major project when you get that kind of quantity and you get that kind of value off the street — it really is important,” Fleury told reporters after the Tuesday board meeting’s open session.
“So, it does impact the stats. I mean, it's not every day that you have those types of things occurring, especially in a community this size, but when they do it, it does have a huge increase in what we see statistically.”
During the presentation, Smith said that total calls for service rose in 2024 to 55,772, up from the previous year’s 54,694. “What you don't see in those numbers are the intense time and resources provided in each call,” she told the board.
Fleury said the severity of many calls they’re required to attend does put a strain on resources.
“We had fifty-five-some-thousand calls for service and out of that, over twenty-thousand are priority calls, which is something that we've talked about in the community several times … that's almost 40 per cent of our calls are priority,” he said.
So, when we're talking about the activity we're seeing, there's some more high-level crimes that we're looking at and it does take a lot of effort from our service.”
