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Home • Crime in the U.S. • 2017 • Crime in the U.S. 2017 • Tables • Table 15 • Table 15 Data Declaration

Table 15 Data Declaration

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Crime Trends, Additional Information About Selected Offenses by Population Group, 2016–2017

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

Important note about rape data

In 2013, the FBI’s UCR Program initiated the collection of rape data under a revised definition within the Summary Reporting System. The term “forcible” was removed from the offense name, and the definition was changed to “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.”

In 2016, the FBI Director approved the recommendation to discontinue the reporting of rape data using the UCR legacy definition beginning in 2017.

General comments

  • This 2-year trend table provides the 2016 and 2017 breakdowns (such as attempts, weapons, types of entry, and property types for the offenses of rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, motor vehicle theft, and arson) and the percent change between these 2 years.
  • 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.

Methodology

  • The data used in creating this table were from all law enforcement agencies submitting at least 6 common months of complete offense reports with breakdowns for 2016 and 2017. If the FBI determines certain variables have created unusual fluctuations in the data, those data are excluded from the tabulations.
  • A crime trend represents the percentage change in crime based on data reported in a prior equivalent period. In calculating trends, the UCR Program includes only common reported months for individual agencies.
  • The rape data reported by those agencies using the UCR legacy definition for either 2016, 2017, or both years are not included in the trend tables 12-15. This includes 1,164 agencies with a total population of 18,671,578.
  • The percent changes shown for the offense of rape are based on data from those agencies that submitted rape data according to the UCR revised definition for both 2016 and 2017 as well as converted data from agencies that reported data for rape, sodomy, and sexual assault with an object via the NIBRS for both years.
  • The following table provides the actual number of reporting agencies and populations covered for rape.

Populations used to calculate rape trends  
by Population Group, 2017 

Population Group 

Agencies using the revised UCR rape definition 

Agency count 

Population 

Total all agencies 

13,563 

279,331,826 

Total Cities 

9,753 

191,562,931 

I (250,000 inhabitants and more) 

78 

57,548,206 

Ia (1,000,000 and over) 

10 

25,129,639 

Ib (500,000 to 999,999) 

23 

17,010,028 

Ic (250,000 to 499,000) 

45 

15,408,539 

II (100,000 to 249,999 inhabitants) 

212 

31,662,804 

III (50,000 to 99,999 inhabitants) 

443 

30,913,606 

IV (25,000 to 49,999 inhabitants) 

762 

26,545,036 

V (10,000 to 24,999 inhabitants) 

1,558 

24,798,507 

VI (Less than 10,000 inhabitants)  

6,700 

20,094,772 

IX (Metropolitan County) 

1,731 

66,149,540 

VIII (Nonmetropolitan County)1 

2,079 

21,619,355 

Suburban Area2 

7,468 

118,770,448 

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 2017 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 2016 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 2016 Census population estimate to derive the agency’s 2017 population estimate.