Category: Violent Crime Reporting

Statistics and Biased Sampling

Back in 1948, the Chicago Tribune published a newspaper declaring “Dewey Defeats Truman.” There was only one problem: Truman won. Here is an AI summary of the event. The 1948 U.S. presidential election is a landmark event in polling history, famously illustrated by the erroneous headline “DEWEY DEFEATS TRUMAN” published by the Chicago Daily Tribune. This […]

Violent Crime Is All About Youth

A report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics on victim/offender age groups for 2023 was just released. You can get it here. Keep in mind that the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) includes simple assault as a violent crime (but excludes murder since it is a survey of crime victims), but the Uniform Crime Reporting […]

LEOKA 2023

In my book, I covered Law Enforcement Officers Killed or Asssaulted (LEOKA). I think now that 2020, 2021, and 2022 have passed, 2023 provides a good opportunity to get back to a certain type of normalcy. However, in talking to many customer-oriented businesses, they report a large increase of rudeness after the pandemic. It is […]

The Rise of Fentanyl & Crystal Meth Arrests

This information comes from the Bureau of Justice Statistics. Here is the full report for Methamphetamine, Cocaine, and Other Psychostimulant Offenses in Federal Courts, 2022 Unfortunately, the report seems to emphasize increases/decreases from FY2021 to FY2022 (FY = Fiscal Year). Since 2021 is still a “pandemic” year that suffers from a variety of governmental restrictions […]

Criminal Victimization, 2023

“This report presents official estimates of nonfatal criminal victimizations reported and not reported to police from BJS’s [Bureau of Justice Statistics’] National Crime Victimization Survey.” The full report is available here. I encourage everyone to read it. Why? Here is an example: How many violent victimizations in 2023 involved a firearm? Many people would answer […]