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   Improving Crime Data Project

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE  

Original Release: May 17, 2004 (revised: May 25, 2004); 2003 data posted June 3, 2004

New Homicide Ranking Controls For Demographic and Social Factors

Researchers associated with the Improving Crime Data (ICD) Project recently released rankings of 67 US cities based on rates of homicide (number of homicides divided by the city's population) in 2002. Following the release of the 2003 FBI Preliminary Uniform Crime Report for 2003 (on May 24, 2004) analysis was performed on the 2003 homicide data as well. The rankings reflect 1) the raw rates per population and 2) the rates adjusted for differences across the cities in demographic and social factors. The adjusted rates result in important changes in the ranking for several cities. Those changes remained fairly consistent between 2002 and 2003 and when there were differences they were due to variation in homicide figures.

Police and other public officials, especially in high-crime-rate cities, often complain that ranking cities by their crime rates is misleading and unfair because cities differ in poverty, unemployment, and other crime-producing factors beyond their control. Criminologists Richard Rosenfeld, Alfred Blumstein, and Robert Friedmann applied a statistical model that adjusts each city's homicide figures for such factors. The researchers maintain that the model produces a more meaningful comparison of city homicide levels, especially for providing insight into the effectiveness of criminal justice policies and programs.

For 2002, eight cities drop and six cities rise by thirty or more places in the homicide ranking when differences in economic disadvantage, population size, and residential stability are statistically controlled. Atlanta, Buffalo, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Detroit, Miami, Milwaukee, and Newark fall by thirty or more places, and Anchorage, Colorado Springs, Omaha, San Francisco, San Jose, and Santa Ana rise by thirty or more places after the statistical adjustment (see Table-1 for unadjusted and adjusted scores). The homicide ranking of other cities remains relatively unchanged. Washington, DC is near the top of both rankings. Virginia Beach, VA is at the bottom of both rankings.

For 2003, six cities drop and five cities rise by thirty or more places when adjusted for the same variables that were used for the 2002 data. Atlanta, Cleveland, Detroit, Memphis, Newark, and Saint Louis fall thirty places or more but the remaining four cities - that also decreased in the 2002 ranking - still show a significant decline of about 25 places. New entries are Memphis and Saint Louis, both of which experienced a significant decline in their homicide figures. Omaha, San Francisco, San Jose, Seattle, and Virginia Beach rise by thirty or more places after statistical adjustment. Of the other three cities Anchorage follows with a high increase but the increase is weaker for Santa Ana and negligible for Colorado Springs (which had a 26% and 52% drop in their homicides respectively). The new entries in 2003 were Virginia Beach and Seattle.

It is also worth noting that four cities had a net change - of adjusted ranking - between 2002 and 2003 of at least thirty places. Tulsa and Virginia Beach have had a significant increase in ranking (as they also did the absolute homicide figures). Oklahoma City also shows a fairly significant increase. Anaheim and Colorado Springs show a significant drop of at least 30 spots. Mesa, Raleigh, Saint Louis, and Santa Ana also show fairly significant drops in adjusted rankings between 2002 and 2003.

The 67 cities in the study comprise all cities with populations greater than 250 thousand in 2000. They contain about 17% of the nation’s population but account for 42% of the homicides committed in the U.S. in 2002.

The homicide study was conducted for the project "Improving Crime Data" (ICD). ICD is funded by the National Institute of Justice and is an initiative of the Great Cities Universities, a consortium of 20 urban public research universities.

ICD will develop and disseminate statistics for homicide and other serious crimes in US cities. Robert Friedmann, Ph.D., of Georgia State University and Richard Rosenfeld, Ph.D., of the University of Missouri-St. Louis are principal and co-principal investigator on the project. The crime monitoring program is sponsored jointly by ICD and the National Consortium on Violence Research (NCOVR). Alfred Blumstein, Ph.D., is the director of NCOVR which is supported by the National Science Foundation, and headquartered at Carnegie Mellon University.

A description of the statistical model used to generate the adjusted city homicide ranking can be found at ICD and at NCOVR. 

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