As families wait for justice for their loved ones, lawmakers in Harrisburg are hoping new funding will help police close unsolved homicides and other violent crimes.
The Violent Incident Clearance and Technological Investigative Methods grant program, known as the VICTIM program, will provide $3.5 million to local police departments throughout Pennsylvania. The bipartisan effort is aimed at helping police solve more crimes through modernizing crime reporting systems and expanding investigative tools.
The $3.5 million investment comes from two sources, $2.5 million from the 2026-2027 state budget and a $1 million match from Arnold Ventures.
The new grant program was first announced in August. It is being administered by the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency, chaired by Lieutenant Governor Austin Davis.
“This is another tool in the toolkit for law enforcement to help increase clearance rates, to help close cases, and to help give families a little bit of justice,” said Lt. Gov. Davis.
Earlier this year, 11 Investigates highlighted the high number of homicides in Allegheny County that remain unsolved through our investigative series Getting Away with Murder. We found hundreds of unsolved murders in the last several years and uncovered city neighborhoods where the majority of homicide cases remain open.
Families like Shawn O’Leary, a 32-year-old father of two and award-winning cook, are still waiting for justice. O’Leary was killed in Duquesne on November 3, 2025.
“I’m in hell and I don’t know how to get out,” Shawn’s father Walt O’Leary said. “There’s got to be some kind of justice.”
Walt O’Leary has now been waiting almost a year without answers.
Rick Lewis has been waiting more than six years for an arrest in his son’s death.
Jason Lewis, a husband, father, new grandfather and business owner, was killed outside a club in Braddock on February 16, 2020.
“The unfairness of it weighs on you,” Lewis said. “I can hear his laugh. I can see his smile.”
As the number of homicide cases continue to stack up, investigators keep working older cases but with limited resources.
Few departments have units dedicated to cold cases, and the ones that do often consist of only a handful of officers.
Pittsburgh police have one detective dedicated solely to investigating unsolved cases or “cold cases.” Allegheny County police do not have any detectives solely dedicated to them.
“We have multiple detectives who specialize in unsolved homicides but none who are solely dedicated to them,” a county police spokesperson told 11 Investigates.
Davis first became passionate about violence prevention after a shooting on his street in McKeesport when he was in high school.
“I can remember feeling like my sense of safety and security was shattered,” Davis said. “I remember hearing the gunshots ring out, and I remember my mom pushing me to the ground... When they stopped, I remember my mom running outside with towels to help the person who’d been shot on our block.”
Davis believes the VICTIM program could help land killers in handcuffs and prevent crimes, reducing the number of community members who experience the traumatic scenes. He also acknowledged $3.5 million is not enough and long-term financial investments are needed.
“It would not shock me if we’re giving out two and a half million dollars that we have 25 million dollars in requests,” Davis said.
“We know from decades of research that solving more crimes with swiftness and certainty is actually the best deterrent for future offending,” said Marc Krupanski, Vice President of Criminal Justice at Arnold Ventures.
11 Investigates spoke with Krupanski over zoom.
Krupanski said the investment in Pennsylvania is the biggest it has pledged in any state so far.
Arnold Ventures is particularly interested in helping small departments in Pennsylvania, getting them up to speed with crime data reporting.
“We did see a gap in terms of the ability of these smaller and local agencies to collect and report data, crime data specifically, through the updated FBI system. This can be a costly process, especially for those smaller agencies,” he said. “Our match funding here is specifically targeted for these smaller agencies to be able to improve their crime data collection reporting.”
Local police departments have until October 21 to apply for funding. There are two tracks based on current NIBRS reporting status, a NIBRS readiness grant and implementation grants.
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