After remaining relatively flat for much of the year, the number of people killed in Los Angeles surged in August, leaving police scrambling to rein in the violence. Through Saturday, the city recorded a nearly 7% increase in homicides — which amounts to 12 more killings — since the start of the year, compared with the same time period in 2014, according to LAPD data. Across the city, 185 people had been killed through Saturday. And at least one other homicide occurred since then — the fatal shooting of a 26-year-old homeless man along the Venice boardwalk on Sunday morning. Thirty-nine people were killed in L.A. last month, LAPD Chief Charlie Beck said, making it the deadliest August the city has seen since 2007, when 41 people were killed.
