Methodology: Law Enforcement Officers Assaulted
The Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program collects information monthly about assaults on duly sworn federal, state, local, tribal, university and college, and county law enforcement officers. The agencies that employ these officers collect and submit data either through their state UCR Programs or, for non-program states, directly to the FBI. For assault data to be included in this publication, law enforcement agencies must have submitted information for all 12 months of 2018 regarding their sworn officers who were assaulted, as well as the number of officers and civilians their agencies employed full time for the reporting year.
Law enforcement agencies report to the UCR Program the number of assaults resulting in injuries to their officers or instances in which an offender used a weapon that could have caused injury or death. Law enforcement agencies report other assaults (i.e., those not causing injury) if they involved more than verbal abuse or minor resistance to an arrest.