I don’t care what your mayor or the news media says, especially in large cities – the police chief or superintendent does not set policy. Mayors never give up that control. The police brass get their marching orders and either follow them or get replaced. Statistical deception is only limited by the creativity or lack thereof by those in charge of presenting the numbers.
The term often thrown around is “killing crime.” Here’s how it works: police reports are categorized on forms generated by the department. The system, created by the FBI, divides crimes into Part One offenses (the most serious) and Part Two offenses (less serious), all under the Uniform Crime Reporting system (UCR).
Take burglary as an example. A burglar breaks into a home to steal property or commit another crime. If the police make an arrest and clear the crime, it’s reported as a burglary. That crime is then cleared by police efficiency stats. But when they can’t make an arrest, police bosses don’t want it reported as a Part One burglary. So, officers are instructed to categorize it as vandalism and simple theft instead. It’s a clever way to cheat—by not reducing the burglary rate but showing an artificially high rate of solving crimes.
And what happens to officers who don’t play along with this bullshit? For starters, they’re reassigned to districts far from their homes. Their chances for promotion evaporate, and their efficiency ratings tank. You get the picture.
Now, how do they cover up homicides? As an investigative TV news producer, I got a tip from a Chicago homicide detective who spilled the beans. He explained that certain cases, like a murdered prostitute estranged from her family, get dumped into a special file labeled “pending death investigations.” The trick is that since these deaths aren’t officially classified as homicides, they never make it to the UCR system.
I asked the detective how I could get the numbers on these death investigations to expose the system. He told me what I already suspected—it would require a mountain of research, and I’d get no help from the department.
So, I took a different route. I filed a public records request with the Cook County Medical Examiner and got access to their case database. I compared the homicides listed in the city of Chicago with what city officials were claiming. The results were shocking: Chicago police had concealed over 350 murders. I passed this information to retired CBS2 reporter Pam Zekman, who confronted former Chicago Police Superintendent Phil Cline with our findings. That story won an Emmy.
If you’re a mayor and don’t like your crime statistics, don’t worry—you can always cheat. Below is a brief rundown of the Uniform Crime Reporting system. Anyone with half a brain can figure out a way to bullshit the public.
The UCR system is a national crime data collection program managed by the FBI. It classifies crimes into two categories: Part One Crimes (the serious stuff, like violent and property crimes) and Part Two Crimes (less serious offenses). Part One Crimes are what most jurisdictions use to gauge the overall crime rate, and these are the numbers the public hears about the most.
Part Two Crimes, on the other hand, cover a broader range of offenses but don’t carry as much weight when calculating crime trends or shaping public perception.
Now that I’ve told you how officials hide or kill crime, here’s the flip side: some jurisdictions over-report crime to snag more federal funds.
So, how trustworthy is the UCR? About as trustworthy as your local politicians!
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