Crime Data: Misleading Statistics

Questions are swirling around crime data in the wake of the deployment of National Guard members to the nation's capital. City officials claim murders have declined.  National data suggests all crime has shrunk. But how reliable are the numbers?  There is evidence the data is problematic. 

Pew Research Center analyzed data in an effort to answer the question: "How much crime is there in the U.S." Their answer: "It's difficult to say for certain." The two primary sources of government crime statistics--the FBI and The Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS)--paint an incomplete picture.

FBI reports, once the gold standard, is pocked with Swiss cheese holes. In 2019, 89% of municipal police departments submitted crime data to the agency.  To compensate for the incomplete data, the FBI estimated the missing municipalities crime numbers.  

In 2020, the FBI recorded a historic single-year increase in homicides of 30% in the aftermath of the George Floyd nationwide riots. There are some experts who believe the violent crime data that year was actually worse because big city police were swamped and reporting may have suffered as a result. 

The 2021 FBI data failed to improve. The bureau modernized its data collection system. Thousands of police agencies fell through the cracks. Only 63% of police departments submitted crime data, meaning 6,000 municipalities failed to report numbers. The FBI reported crime fell.   

Then in 2022, the FBI under Christopher Wray regrouped to right the data ship.  Pew reports 83% of police agencies participated. Two of the largest police departments in the country--New York and Los Angeles--were missing from the final FBI crime report. Unsurprisingly, crime declined.   

The FBI initially reported an estimated 1.7% decrease in violent crime. Later in 2023, the agency quietly revised the data, reporting a 4.5% increase in crime for 2022.  The FBI failed to include 1,699 murder, 7,780 rapes, 33,459 robberies and 37,091 aggravated assaults--a staggering oversight.

The bureau reported 19,800 homicide victims in 2023.  The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued its cause of death data for the same year, counting 22,830 homicide deaths.  Its records are compiled from the Vital Statistics Cooperative Program provided by 57 jurisdictions. 

Last month the FBI issued its 2024 report from 16,419 police departments, still short of the 18,000 previously reporting crime data. Violent crime decreased 4.5%.  Leaving aside the issue of the veracity of the data, a violent crime occurred on average every 25.9 seconds somewhere in America.  

The Bureau of Justice Statistics National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) is second only to the FBI in perceived importance. It is a national survey of about 240,000 people 12 and older.  Participants are asked if they have been a victim of a crime in the past six months.  The methodology obviously eliminates murder victims, an obvious flaw.

However, the NCVS is recognized as more accurate in capturing the overall picture of violent crime, which includes rape, robbery aggravated assault, robbery and manslaughter.   While the FBI reported decreases in 2021 and 2022, the NCVS data for the same period shows violent victimization rose 75%.    

Data from most sources depends on local police records. And that's another problem.  In Washington, D.C., the flashpoint for crime, the head of the Metropolitan Police Department's top union official claims higher ups are fudging the crime data by directing cops to downgrade felonies to a lesser offense,

The union boss Gregg Pemberton shared his accusations with NBC Washington.  The contention followed the police department's suspension of a commander in mid-May for allegedly changing crime statistics in his local district. No word on how widespread the practice is.  

Even though the nation's capital has recorded a 27% drop in violent crime this year, it still has the fourth highest homicide rate in the country, nearly six times higher than New York City.  The city has recorded 103 fatal shootings this year.  For comparison, there were 105 murders in 2014.

Chicago has been in the spotlight after President Trump threatened to send the National Guard to the Windy City.  Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has stiff armed any suggestion of federal assistance, pointing out homicides decreased by 7.3% last year, but still higher than pre-pandemic figures.

A University of Chicago Crime Lab report underscores the "persistent challenging patterns" of violence in the city.  Black residents are 22 more times likely to be killed compared to white residents. In some Chicago neighborhoods, a black person is 68 times more likely to be a victim of a fatal shooting.

And, while violent crime is down, the Crime Lab notes it is still higher than the five year average.  The primary contributors are soaring aggravated assaults, aggravated batteries and robberies, according to the Crime Lab. Since 2010, the rate at which shooting victims die from a gunshot has soared 44.9%.

You won't hear those numbers from the mayor, who has overseen the shrinking of the Chicago police force.  There are now fewer officers than the city had in 2018, a decline of nearly 13%.  In addition, Johnson has failed to deliver on a campaign pledge to add 200 more detectives, WGN reported.

The mayor's credibility took another hit Labor Day weekend when 58 Chicagoans were shot, eight fatally.  This underscores the issue in many large cities.  Crime may be down, if you believe the statistics, but it begs the question: How much crime is too much?

In many big cities such as Chicago, too many repeat offenders with long criminal records are arrested and freed without bail.  Failure to address this situation results in career criminals preying on the most vulnerable. Until district attorneys incarcerate thugs, systemic violent crime will continue.  

The credibility of crime data is not some conservative conspiracy as Democrats contend.  The Legal Defense Fund, a liberal group, called crime statistics "unreliable" because many crimes go unreported by victims.  Even reported crimes may not be recorded by police, the group points out.

Another liberal group, the VERA Institute, examined the FBI data and gave this assessment: "The FBI estimates national and state totals, sometimes using a relative small percentage of jurisdictions in a state" to flesh out its data making the numbers "deeply problematic."

VERA performed its own research on the quality of policing data from 94 of the country's largest cities.  Researchers concluded: "The results were, perhaps, predictably underwhelming.  Of the 94 localities included, only 21 scored more than 50 out of 100 on Vera's index, which rates the data's completeness. 

Public safety and crime are key issues with voters.  A recent national poll commissioned by the Associated Press (AP) found that 81% of Americans believe crime is a major problem in big cities.  Those running America's largest cities often seem out of touch with local concerns.    

It's time for Congress to standardize crime reporting methodology for local and state police organizations, while ending voluntary participation, and instead mandating records be furnished to the FBI. The agency also should be required to overhaul its processes in the interest of accuracy.

Crime data is not an academic exercise.  The numbers are essential to understanding the resources--both funding and manpower--needed to make all Americans safer.    

Defunding Police In The Midst of Crime Waves

One-year-old Davell Gardner reclined in a stroller near a Brooklyn playground.  His father stood admiring his son.  Suddenly two men approached and opened fire.  A bullet pierced little Davell in the stomach.  He died minutes later at a local hospital.  Davell was two months shy of his second birthday.

The tragedy in the New York City area was one of seven murders on the same day.  Davell is just the youngest victim in a deadly killing spree in the nation's largest city.  In one bloody 28-day period, New York City recorded 42 murders, a 13.5% increase from the same period a year ago.

Davell's sad death was the exclamation point to New York City's 24% spike in murders from 2019. The boy's father, Davell Gardner Sr., had a message for the thugs who killed his infant son: "These guys just took my son's life.  For what?  He didn't do nothing to nobody."

The boy's grandmother Samantha Gardner minced no words.  "For the cowards that did this, you should be ashamed of yourself because everybody talks about Black Lives Matter.  What about baby lives? You took an innocent from his mother and father as well as the grandparents."

New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio presides over the crime outbreak with appalling ineptness. He has the audacity to proclaim his administration has been tough on crime, while leading the effort to defund the police department, the thin blue line that stands between peace and anarchy on the streets.

De Blasio championed the city council's recent vote to slash $1 billion from the police department's $6 billion budget.  The mayor pledged the funds would go to "youth programs and recreation centers." It wouldn't have prevented Davell Gardner's murder. He was wounded near a Brooklyn playground.

De Blasio, a harsh critic of the police department, ignores the soaring number of shootings. Last week New York passed another grisly milestone when it recorded shooting number 777, surpassing the figures for all of last year.  The mayor has done nothing but assure New Yorkers he is praying for the victims.

Since the George Floyd death on May 25, there has been a nationwide escalation in crime.  The last time the country witnessed such a rise of this magnitude was in 2015 and 2016, after the controversy connected to the killing of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri.

Gotham City's crime surge pales in comparison to gory Chicago.  In the Windy City, murders are up 51% from 2019.  In one 28-day period, Chicago killings soared 89% compared to the same period a year ago. Shootings have increased 47%,   There have been 414 murders this year, a record clip even for Chicago.

One of the latest victims is a nine-year-old boy who was playing in a vacant lot near the site of a former housing project.  Janari Ricks and  a few friends were caught in deadly gunfire that ignited nearby.  A stray bullet struck the youth in his chest. He was pronounced dead at a local hospital.

A few days earlier 15 people were wounded in an a mass shooting at a funeral.  Gunmen fired from a vehicle that sped away before it crashed one block later.  The criminals fled.  The victims included at least 10 women, according to police reports. The scene is all too familiar to Chicagons.  

Last year 13 people were wounded, four of them critically, in a memorial gathering.  In 2018, six people were shot as mourners were leaving a church. In 2013, gunmen shot 13 people outside funeral services, wounding a three-year-old boy.  In 2012, two men were shot outside a church memorial service.

Police have not escaped violence.  Three Chicago police officers were shot by a carjacking suspect on a Thursday morning.  The prisoner was taken out of a patrol van and walked into the Northwest Side police station when he opened fire wounding the officers. Police are investigating where the suspect got the gun. 

In the midst of a crime rampage, Chicago's tragically incompetent Mayor Lori Lightfoot has stiff-armed growing calls to defund the police by city council members.  Her stance has more to do with racial politics than her support for the city's men and women who are hired to protect citizens.

"When you talk about defunding, you're talking about getting rid of officers.  Most of our diversity lies in junior officers.  Which means you are getting rid of black and brown people," she told the Chicago Tribune. Like many mayors, she views the police department as part of the political spoils of her office.

West Coast cities have been some of the most aggressive in scaling back police budgets.  In Seattle the city Council carved 50% out of the current budget and has already chopped spending for next year by $76 million.  Seattle experienced a stunning 525% increase in crime in July.

During the height of violent protests, Police Chief Carmen Best warned local residents and businesses that her department would not be able to contain unruly crowds to prevent looting, arson and rioting.  The city council had shackled police by outlawing the use of pepper spray, a tool for dispersing crowds.

Portland's City Council sliced $15 million from its police budget.  "Defunding the police is a victory," the City Council said in a statement. And the council threatened: "We are not done."  Violent shootings have surged 240% in the city compared to the same period a year ago.

Portland recorded more homicides in July than in any other month over the last 30 years.  And the violence is spreading like a cancer.  In the latest incident, rioters doused an elderly woman with white paint and harassed another who was using a walker to shuffle through the crowd.  

In Minneapolis, scene of the George Floyd incident, the city council ripped $10 million from the police budget.  Homicides have jumped 60% from 2019.  Violent shootings have totaled 269, surpassing the number for all of 2019. 

There are two ironies to the cities' Bataan-like march to defund police.  The overwhelming majority of shooting victims listed in this article are African-Americans. Secondly, the neighborhoods most impacted by the crimes are predominantly black.  African-Americans are demanding more police presence not less.

That is paradoxical because the loudest voice for defunding police has been the Black Lives Matter crowd. There are other organizations that have joined the chorus too.  However, if activists are concerned for black lives they should be advocating for beefed up police funding and presence in black neighborhoods.

A recent Pew Research study found more Americans agree with increasing local police spending (30%) than endorse defunding (25%). A total of 42% of those surveyed support the current level of funding as appropriate.  Despite the media drumbeat, most Americans are not in favor of defunding police.

The fact is Black Lives Matter and other politically motivated organizations care more about creating chaos and spreading a false narrative than about African-Americans.  Appallingly, the result has been a media-backed stampede in support of BLM's campaign to defund the very people protecting black lives.