Buffalo Police begins new initiative in push to solve cold cases

BUFFALO, N.Y. (WIVB) — The Buffalo Police Department announced Tuesday a new initiative that they hope will help them solve cold homicide cases in the city.

The department will use a monthly billboard, located on the corner of Michigan Avenue and Cherry Street, with photos of a homicide victim whose case they are looking to solve, as well as posting a video with family testimonials asking for help in finding perpetrators.

The first victim to be featured is Jazzmine Fomby, the 14-year-old who was killed when she was among six teenagers shot at a party near Jefferson Avenue on the evening of May 4. Her billboard was erected on Monday. Fomby's family was in attendance at Tuesday's news conference.

"We know for a fact that there were a significant amount of people at the homicide," Buffalo Police Commissioner Joseph Gramaglia said. "We know for a fact that there were witnesses and that people know something and they can come forward and put this case over the top so that we can make an arrest."

An arrest has yet to be made in that incident.

"I just wish they would come forward," Fomby's mother Angel said. "That's all."

The department has used billboards in the past to solicit help on cases, but the use of social media is new. The department is planning on choosing who they put on billboards strategically based on evidence they already have.

The clearance rate on homicides in the city is over 50% for this year, Gramaglia said. There have been 22 homicides in Buffalo this year, including a shooting on Monday night in the Schiller Park neighborhood that left a 45-year-old man dead. Of the 22, an arrest has been made in 14 of them and some other cases are "very active and very close," so the department expects the clearance rate to go up.

"This is a tremendous amount of courage for families to be able to come forward and talk about their loves ones," Gramaglia said. "Someone will see this and they'll have a conscience, and they'll want to come forward and do something."