FBI report shows decrease in US violent crime for second straight year News
FBI report shows decrease in US violent crime for second straight year

[JURIST] The 2008 Crime in the US (CIUS) report [materials; report summary] released Monday by the FBI indicates that the level of violent crime in the US dropped by 1.9 percent between 2007 and 2008. Specifically, between 2006 and 2007, the estimated number of forcible rapes dropped by 1.6 percent to 89,000, the lowest figure in the past 20 years. Murders and non-negligent manslaughters dropped by 3.9 percent, aggravated assaults by 2.5 percent, and robberies by 0.7 percent. Additionally, the rate of property crime, which has decreased each year over the past five years, decreased again by about 0.8 percent. The western region of the US showed the largest decrease in violent crimes.

The drop follows a 0.7 percent drop [JURIST report] for 2007. That came after two years of increasing rates of similar crimes, including a 2006 increase of 1.3 percent and a 2005 increase of 2.3 percent [JURIST reports].