Preliminary Crime Statistics for 2005

Washington, D.C.—The FBI released the Preliminary Annual Uniform Crime Report for 2005 today, which showed a mixed direction in crime nationwide: the number of violent crime offenses rose 2.5 percent, but the number of property crime offenses decreased 1.6 percent when compared with data from 2004. The FBI collected these preliminary data from 12,485 law enforcement agencies that submitted 6 to 12 months of offense data through the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program in both 2004 and 2005.

Violent Crime

The violent crime category includes murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault offenses. Nationally, preliminary data for 2005 showed increases in three of the four violent crimes from the previous year’s data. The number of murders and nonnegligent manslaughters rose 4.8 percent. Robbery offenses increased 4.5 percent, and the number of aggravated assaults was up 1.9 percent. Forcible rape was the only offense among the violent crimes that decreased in volume in 2005, down 1.9 percent from the 2004 figure.

A breakdown of the 2005 data by population group revealed that all city population groups experienced increases in violent crime when compared with those data reported for the previous year, with the exception of the Nation’s largest cities, 1 million and over in population, where the number of violent crimes was down 0.4 percent. By percent change in the number of violent crime offenses in 2005 compared with totals from 2004, cities with populations from 500,000 to 999,999 inhabitants saw the greatest increase, 8.3 percent, and cities with populations of 10,000 to 24,999 saw the smallest increase, 0.5 percent. In the Nation’s metropolitan counties, violent crime was up 2.1 percent, and in nonmetropolitan counties, it increased 1.0 percent.

A further examination of violent crime data for the population groups showed that cities with populations from 100,000 to 249,999 had the greatest increase in the number of murders, up 12.5 percent. Cities with 500,000 to 999,999 inhabitants experienced the greatest increases in both robbery, 9.9 percent, and aggravated assault, 8.5 percent. The number of offenses of forcible rape decreased in all city population groups except in those cities with under 10,000 in population, where the number of forcible rape offenses was up 1.5 percent from the 2004 level.

The Nation’s four regions all saw increases in violent crime in 2005. The Midwest experienced the steepest increase, 5.7 percent. The West had a 1.9-percent increase from the previous year’s number; the South, a 1.8-percent rise; and the Northeast, a 1.4-percent increase. All four regions had increases in murder, robbery, and aggravated assault. Contrary to the other three violent crime offenses, the number of forcible rapes declined in each region.

Property Crime

Crimes that the UCR Program publishes in the property crime category include burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft. (Arson is considered a property crime, but the arson data are not included in the property crime total.) For 2005, the number of larceny-theft offenses was down 2.5 percent, and the number of motor vehicle thefts showed no significant change from the previous year’s data. Burglary, however, showed a 0.6-percent increase in the number of offenses from the 2004 data. The number of arson offenses decreased 2.2 percent.

Among the population groups, cities with populations of 1 million and over had the greatest decrease, 3.3 percent, in property crimes in 2005 when compared with 2004 figures. Cities with 25,000 to 49,999 inhabitants and the Nation’s smallest cities, those with populations of less than 10,000, had the smallest decrease in their property crimes, 0.7 percent. Collectively, metropolitan counties registered a 0.6-percent decrease in property crime, and nonmetropolitan counties, a 1.0-percent decline.

A breakdown of property crimes by population group showed that the only groups to show decreases in burglary were the Nation’s largest cities, those with 1 million and over in population, and nonmetropolitan counties, with declines of 1.5-percent and 2.7-percent, respectively. The number of burglary offenses increased by the greatest percentage, 3.5 percent, in cities with 250,000 to 499,999 inhabitants. The number of larceny-theft offenses decreased in all population groups, with the Nation’s largest cities showing the greatest decrease, 4.3 percent. The number of motor vehicle thefts increased 1.9 percent from the previous year in cities with 10,000 to 24,999 people, the greatest increase by percentage of all city population groups. Cities with 1 million and over inhabitants registered the greatest decline in motor vehicle thefts, 1.8 percent. For the offense of arson, cities 500,000 to 999,999 in population showed the greatest decrease by percentage, a drop of 10.6 percent from 2004 data.

The number of property crimes decreased in all four regions of the country. The greatest decrease was in the Northeast Region with a 3.1-percent drop. Property crimes declined

1.7 percent in the South, 1.3 percent in the West, and 0.7 percent in the Midwest. However, a breakdown of property crimes by offense type showed that the number of burglaries decreased in the Northeast alone, dropping 2.4 percent from the previous year’s figure. Burglary increased

3.8 percent in the Midwest, 0.5 percent in the South, and 0.1 percent in the West.

Final crime statistics for 2005 will be available in Crime in the United States, which will be published this fall on the FBI’s Internet site.