LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- As Louisville wrestles with an epidemic of violence, Louisville Metro Police crime data shows more killers are getting away with it.

A WDRB review of outstanding murder cases LMPD lists online shows more than 400 unsolved homicides in the last five years. In fact, the data shows a person who kills someone in Louisville has a greater than 50% chance of not being arrested.

They’re sobering statistics that Candy Linear knows all to well.

“Some days I wake up and I'm like, there's no way Nylah is gone. I have a lot of days like that,” Linear said as tears rolled down her face remembering her daughter Nylah Linear. "Then I close my eyes and lately I just keep seeing her on that gurney."

Sunday marks three years since her 16-year old daughter Nylah Linear died in a drive-by shooting. The teen was standing outside her aunt's house at Market Street and Cecil Avenue with her two younger sister on the afternoon of July 21, 2021 when she was hit by a stray bullet.

“Nylah was an innocent bystander,” Linear said. “She was innocent.”

Three years later there has been no arrests, no answers and for no peace for Linear.

“The original officer on my daughter's case retired and nobody told me,” she said. “My daughter's case hadn't been reassigned or anything. It was just sitting idle until I went to a town hall meeting and spoke about it. Now we’re waiting on forensics.”

Linear knows she is not alone. She said she feels for those 400-plus other families who are also looking for closure.

“I’m speaking on behalf of the mothers who don’t have their children…it’s a lot of mothers who can’t speak," Linear said. "It’s so painful they can’t talk about it. I stand for the mothers because it needs to be talked about. They need to put light on it (to solve these cases).”

WDRB studied city data going back to 2019. WDRB found LMPD's clearance rate for arrests after a criminal homicide at about 47 percent, meaning one out of every two murders in the city goes unsolved, more than 400 and counting.

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"Obviously violent crime here recently in the last few years, it's been at a level that's just completely unacceptable," LMPD interim chief Paul Humphrey said in an interview with WDRB News last month. "And so we need the citizens to know that we are not going away but we're not going to falter in our effort to make sure we keep them safe."

Many of the unsolved cases involve teens. The city reports show at least 43 juveniles have been killed in Louisville since Nylah Linear died in July of 2021 and one of them was her cousin.

“Bre was different than the other kids,” Breyasia Walker’s mother Jamilah McNealy said in a quivering faint voice as she wiped tears from her cheek. “Don't forget that part. She was a cheerleader, a dancer and a basketball player and they took her from me.”

Nylah's 16-year-old cousin was found shot in the passenger seat of a car at 26th and Oak streets in August of 2023.

It was stolen and the driver had run off. McNealy said she found her daughter as she drove up on the scene while out with her other children running errands. It wasn’t far from their home.

One family was hit with the unimaginable twice in three years and both cases remain unsolved.

“So much pain, it's unbelievable,” Linear said.

She hopes more attention for all families waiting for answers will drum up new clues.

“Help us.”

That hope is all she left -- and she says it's hard to hold onto most days.

Linear started a foundation in Nylah's name helping families who have lost their children to gun violence. She is inviting all families who have suffered that loss to take part in a balloon release Sunday at 5 p.m. at Waterfront Park, marking three years since Nylah’s passing.

To learn more about the Nylah Linear Foundation, click here. 

Anyone with information about any shooting is asked to call LMPD's anonymous crime tip line at (502) 574-LMPD (5673). Tips can also be submitted anonymously through the department's online crime tip portal by clicking here.

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