Sheriff Lee Baca has launched LACountyMurders.com, a website to publicize homicide stats and spread information about suspects and victims. There is an edge of scare tactic about it. The site's purpose, it says, is "educate the citizens of Los Angeles County of the potential violence that lurks within every community in this county."

The murder rate in Los Angeles County has surpassed that found in the cities of New York, Chicago and Detroit, cities that enjoy a much larger ratio of police to citizens than is the case in this county. Only a fraction of the murders that are committed on a daily basis in this county are reported in the news media. Annually, hundreds of our citizens meet a violent death, but die anonymously, known only to their families and friends, and the overburdened homicide investigators who seek justice for them.

Many law enforcement professionals believe that motion pictures, television programs and some contemporary music with themes of violence have desensitized the public to the specter of violent death. The information you are about to view will present numbers you may find staggering. If you choose to utilize the links to specific law enforcement agencies, it may bring a name, and in some cases a face, to those who have died at the hands of others in this county.

There's even a clickable map to see where murders occur, but it leaves out the city of Los Angeles. Only homicides in the territory patrolled by the sheriff are included.