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Home • Crime in the U.S. • 2016 • Crime in the U.S. 2016 • Tables • Table 11 • Table 11 Data Declaration

Table 11 Data Declaration

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Rate: Number of Crimes per 100,000 Inhabitants by Population Group, 2016

The FBI collects these data through the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program.

Important note about rape data

In 2013, the UCR Program initiated the collection of rape data under a revised definition and removed the term “forcible” from the offense name. The UCR Program now defines rape as follows:

Rape (revised definition): Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim. (This includes the offenses of rape, sodomy, and sexual assault with an object as converted from data submitted via the National Incident-Based Reporting System.)

Rape (legacy definition): The carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will.

General comments

  • This table provides the rate per 100,000 inhabitants and the number of offenses known to law enforcement for violent crimes (murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault) and property crimes (burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft) nationally and by city and county groupings for law enforcement agencies submitting 12 months of complete data for 2016. In addition, the table furnishes the number of agencies meeting the criteria for inclusion in this table and provides the estimated population for each population group. 
  • The Nonmetropolitan Counties classification includes state police agencies that report aggregately for the entire state.  
  • Suburban areas include law enforcement agencies in cities with less than 50,000 inhabitants and county law enforcement agencies that are within a Metropolitan Statistical Area. 
  • Suburban areas exclude all metropolitan agencies associated with a principal city. The agencies associated with suburban areas also appear in other groups within this table. 
  • The UCR Program does not have sufficient data to publish arson offenses in this table. 

Methodology

  • The data used in creating this table were from all law enforcement agencies submitting 12 months of complete data (except arson) for 2016. 
  • The FBI derived the offense rates by first dividing the aggregated offense counts by the aggregated populations covered by contributing agencies for which 12 months of complete data were supplied and then multiplying the resulting figure by 100,000. 
  • The rape rates were calculated using the population of the agencies based on the UCR definition of rape (revised or legacy) they used to submit data. See table below. 

Populations used to calculate rape rates (based on rape definition used for submitted data)
by Population Group, 2016

Population Group

Population
(agencies using revised UCR rape definition)

Population
(agencies using legacy UCR rape definition)

Total all agencies

278,534,582

26,305,241

Total Cities

193,926,844

13,780,386

I (250,000 inhabitants and more)

58,912,430

2,376,681

Ia (1,000,000 and over)

27,658,777

0

Ib (500,000 to 999,999)

15,966,189

1,457,939

Ic (250,000 to 499,000)

15,287,464

918,742

II (100,000 to 249,999 inhabitants)

30,721,183

1,543,994

III (50,000 to 99,999 inhabitants)

31,331,565

1,991,818

IV (25,000 to 49,999 inhabitants)

27,091,004

2,651,461

V (10,000 to 24,999 inhabitants)

25,898,902

2,762,308

VI (Less than 10,000 inhabitants)

19,971,760

2,454,124

IX (Metropolitan County)

63,880,427

9,300,577

VIII (Nonmetropolitan County)1

20,727,311

3,224,278

Suburban Area2

118,247,135

14,122,805


1Includes state police agencies that report aggregately for the entire state.

2Suburban areas include law enforcement agencies in cities with less than 50,000 inhabitants and county law enforcement agencies that are within a Metropolitan Statistical Area. Suburban areas exclude all metropolitan agencies associated with a principal city. The agencies associated with suburban areas also appear in other groups within this table.

Population groups

The UCR Program uses the following population group designations:

Population Group

Political Label

Population Range

I

City

250,000 and more

II

City

100,000 to 249,999

III

City

50,000 to 99,999

IV

City

25,000 to 49,999

V

City

10,000 to 24,999

VI1,2

City

Less than 10,000

VIII (Nonmetropolitan County)2

County

N/A

IX (Metropolitan County)2

County

N/A


1Includes universities and colleges to which no population is attributed.

2Includes state police to which no population is attributed.

Population estimation

For the 2016 population estimates used in this table, the FBI computed individual rates of growth from one year to the next for every city/town and county using 2010 decennial population counts and 2011 through 2015 population estimates from the U.S. Census Bureau. Each agency’s rates of growth were averaged; that average was then applied and added to its 2015 Census population estimate to derive the agency’s 2016 population estimate.