Less Deadly Crimes and a More Efficient Way to Count Them

According to the newly released annual report from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), there has been a decline in assaults and murders across the United States in 2022.

On the national scene, murder rates have dropped by more than 6% and violent crimes have also fell. It is worth noting that in Chicago, assaults have dropped by nearly 80% since 2020.

When the FBI embarked on a significant transition in how crime data was reported as of January 1, 2021, many police agencies could not make the transition in time, so the 2021 report was primarily based on estimates. The 2022 annual report includes data from 85% of agencies – 70.4% used the new protocol called National Incident-Based Reporting System, and 12.9% used the decades-old Summary Reporting System – covering 93.5% of the population. According to estimates from the Council on Criminal Justice, there should be murder dropping by around 10% in selections of large cities in 2023, as well as a decline in aggravated assault.