The Department of Justice (DOJ) announced on Thursday that, along with U.S. Marshals Service agents, it had arrested more than 200 fugitives and located several children around southern Illinois and eastern Missouri, as part of a month-long operation.
Since June 1, U.S. Marshals and members of the federal Operation Patriot Shield task force have arrested 224 people in Missouri and Illinois. They have also cleared 290 felony arrest warrants, and three missing children were also rescued, according to the statement.
Around 30 percent of the warrants were on narcotics-related charges, 28 percent were for weapons offenses, and 20 percent were related to violent crimes, including homicide charges, the DOJ said. Fentanyl, heroin, methamphetamine, marijuana, and firearms were also seized by the U.S. Marshals.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Missouri, which includes the city of St. Louis, said in the news release that it indicted 35 people for violent crimes, drug-related crimes, or gun crimes. Many of those who were arrested had drugs, guns, or both, it added. Some were felons who were previously convicted of violent crimes, the office said.
In the Southern District of Illinois, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said it indicted 11 people for various crimes, including child sexual exploitation, as well as firearms, assault, and drug charges.
“Operation Patriot Shield represented an intensive effort by the U.S. Marshals Service in the apprehension of the most violent offenders in the St. Louis Metro Area and the Southern District of Illinois,” said Southern District of Illinois U.S. Marshal David C. Davis in a statement.
“The task force concentrated on arresting the most egregious defendants who were wanted for homicide, drug offenses, weapons offenses, and other violent crimes.”
U.S. Attorney Thomas C. Albus of the Eastern District of Missouri said in a statement that the goal of the operation is to lower “the typical summer surge in violent crime” in the area, adding that the people who have been arrested were “actively evading capture, some through the use of an alias and others by fleeing the jurisdiction where they were charged.”
“Some of these cases are part of Operation Take Back America, a nationwide initiative that marshals the full resources of the Department of Justice to repel the invasion of illegal immigration, achieve the total elimination of cartels and transnational criminal organizations, and protect our communities from the perpetrators of violent crime,” the DOJ said.
Historically, St. Louis has seen some of the highest violent crime rates in the United States. The city recorded its worst homicide rate for 50 years in 2020, with police saying at the time that 262 people were killed, or five fewer than the record of 267 set in 1993. Because the city’s population has declined since 1993, the homicide rate was higher in 2020.
However, the homicide rate in the city appears to be on a downward trajectory in recent years, according to data from the Metropolitan Police Department.
An update this week from the department shows that 63 homicides were reported as of July 2026. In comparison, 141 homicides were reported in 2025, 151 in 2024, 160 in 2023, and 200 in 2022.
