Let the spinning begin
The nation’s murder rate jumped 2 percent during the first six months of this year, with the highest increases in small towns and the Midwest, the FBI said Monday. Crime fell nationwide for other significant offenses, including rape, arson and assault.
After a dramatic decline in the number of murders last year, when the murder rate fell 5.7 percent, it ticked upward 2.1 percent between January and June. Citing figures collected under its uniform crime reports, the FBI said cities with fewer than 10,000 people saw the largest increases, of 13 percent.
The raw data is here.
December 19th, 2005 at 2:17 pm
Once you hit zero, your pretty much compelled to go up. I think that is what is happening here. The murder rate has dropped so low nationwide, its tough for it to go anywhere else. That, and in smaller cities and towns, the emergence of the meth epidemic and the violence associated with groups like MS-13 would seem to be the most likely reasons.
December 19th, 2005 at 2:17 pm
I might add, that at least in Virginia, machette’s seem to be the MS-13 weapon of choice.
December 19th, 2005 at 4:24 pm
Tip: If you’re looking for the TN data in the “Murder” interactive map you’ll find an error in the link to the XLS file. The link misspells Tennessee as tenessee, correct the spelling to get the file.
December 19th, 2005 at 4:30 pm
I wonder what areas accounted for the rise in murder rate? did the rise occur in urban areas and affect the whole country? Or was it the same nation wide?
December 19th, 2005 at 5:04 pm
I blame the expiration of the “assault” weapons ban for causing people to go out and kill each other with everything else. That law worked great when it was in force; in fact, I never once got shot by one of those things.
December 20th, 2005 at 10:04 am
Xrlq,
That reminds me of a story… a guy is standing in downtown Manhattan, banging on a sign with a baseball bat. A man walks up to him and asks him what he’s doing. The guy replies, “I’m keeping the tigers away.” The second replies, “But there are no tigers in Manhattan.” The first says, “See, it works!”
December 20th, 2005 at 3:35 pm
Xrlq:
Nah, it’s because we as a nation aren’t executing enough people, remember?
December 20th, 2005 at 5:46 pm
That too. Or not executing the right ones, anyway.