BALTIMORE _ From the back door of his North Baltimore rowhome, Michael Makel Sr. can see the apartment complex where his 19-year-old son was killed, and he wonders whether anyone will ever be held accountable.
Nearly a year after the shooting, the 47-year-old father says he is tired of waiting for answers and having his hopes dashed. Even more, he says, he's tired of the "bureaucracy" _ of police detectives and prosecutors pointing fingers at each other as the investigation into the killing of his namesake drags on.
"I'm angry," Makel says, "that those who are in charge and are empowered to resolve these things aren't."
He is not alone.
While Baltimore police have improved their homicide clearance rate from 30 percent in 2015 to 56 percent so far this year, the number of families who have lost loved ones continues to mount as the death toll rises. The city has experienced more than 250 homicides so far this year.
Adding to their despair, some say, is the sense that whoever brought death to their family is still out there, ready to strike again, and that police are too overwhelmed to do anything about it.
"At times, you feel like you are fighting them as well as the people who killed your loved one," Makel says.
Makel, who says his mother was killed in the same area in the 1970s, says the detective working his son's killing told him within days of the shooting that he knew who was responsible, but that police and prosecutors have been unable to agree on whether there is enough evidence to file charges.
Officials in Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn J. Mosby's office have told Makel the evidence isn't there yet, but have provided little in the way of explanation, he says.
"I would love to have some answers," he says. "I feel like we're due that much."
Mosby's office declined to comment on the case.
T.J. Smith, a police spokesman, said the police department has people of interest or suspects in several open homicide cases, but "must meet the threshold of probable cause in order to charge them," and hasn't gotten there yet.
"It's a tragedy and one can only imagine the hopelessness that a family feels when a potential suspect in their loved ones murder has been identified, but probable cause hasn't been met," Smith said.
Smith's own brother was killed in the city in July. A man has been charged in that killing.
In the Makel case, Smith said, "we are continuing to work diligently ... in hopes of gathering more evidence to cross the threshold of probable cause. We consult with the State's Attorney's Office, and it would not be wise for us to move forward on murder charges if the State's Attorney's Office disagrees."
The police department this year ended a six-year agreement with the state's attorney's office that gave prosecutors the sole authority to charge homicide suspects.
Now when police believe they have evidence to bring homicide charges and prosecutors disagree, a committee of four commanders reviews the case.
Makel says he was told by police investigators that his son's case would go before that panel, but has been given contradicting statements since from police and prosecutors.
"I don't know if I've been lied to," he says. "Throughout the whole process, I just feel let down by each of these agencies. It's just a slap in the face of a parent whose 19-year-old son was murdered."
Smith said police "are not at a point where probable cause exists for an arrest" in the Makel case.
"Even with our panel," he said, "we still work with the prosecutorial body to move forward."
Smith would not say whether the panel has overruled prosecutors in any cases since its inception.
Ghalila Pietros' brother was killed in West Baltimore last month. Not knowing what happened in his unsolved killing, she says, has left her feeling as if she is floating in empty space, with nothing to grab onto.
"You want to see justice happen, but it's not happening," she says. "And it's not just us. It seems like it's a problem throughout the city of Baltimore."
Police often say that a small number of criminals and "trigger pullers" is responsible for a disproportionate amount of violent crime in the city. Pietros believes that to be true. She says it isn't reassuring, but terrifying.
"The part that really scares me is that it seems like we are just allowing these serial killers to do what they want to do," she says.
Degoul Pietros, 36, lived in Washington. But he was in West Baltimore visiting his brother Ezana and his three nephews in Penn North when he was killed, his sister says. He wasn't perfect, she says, and had a criminal record, but had just graduated at the end of June from a culinary program in Washington, had interned at top-notch restaurants, and had just landed a new cooking gig.
He was shot in the head about 9:55 p.m. Aug. 2 in the 2500 block of Francis Street, police said. His sister says he was cooking dinner for the family when he ran out to the store for more ingredients.
He was carjacked soon afterward, his sister says.
His family, immigrants from Eritrea, don't know what to make of the killing, Ghalila Pietros says.
"We definitely don't know the who," she says. "We definitely don't know the why."
She thinks police should be doing more to find and arrest the killer, she says, but understands that they have their limits. She compares Baltimore to war zones.
"Am I frustrated that police do not have the person? Absolutely. But I also think it's the environment they are in," she says. "They're overwhelmed. It's like they're in Afghanistan or Iraq."
Makel, who has lived in his West Cold Spring Lane home about seven years and sells heating and plumbing supplies in Baltimore County, says his son "sold marijuana and smoked marijuana" and had a minor criminal record. But he wasn't involved in violence and was a good person, his father says.
Michael Makel Jr. was found with multiple gunshot wounds to the body about 3:45 a.m. Oct. 30, 2016, police said.
Makel believes whoever killed his son did so to rob him.
He wishes he could move, to take his young daughter out of the city and away from all the things that remind her of her brother's killing. But he says he owes too much money on his house to do that.
He would feel more comfortable if police made an arrest in the killing, he says. But he doesn't know whether that will ever happen, and says he has almost given up hope.
"Nobody," he says, "will give me any answers."
