Friday, October 21, 2011

Say it ain't so, Joe! Biden’s absurd claims about rising rape and murder rates

Read it here: The Washington Post
Posted by at

2 comments:

slwerner said...

Based on the published UCR numbers,

2008
City of Flint: 32 murders, 103 rapes
Surrounding area: 37 murders, 239 rapes
RATE PER 100,000 INHABITANTS: murder, 8.6; rape 55.5 percent (sic) [the inclusion of “percent” is either in error, the reported number being rate per 100,000 (which would make it 0.055%); or is some other “undefined” calculated value]
Something doesn’t seem to be adding up.

Based on the metropolitan area numbers, there were a total of 69 murders, thus, given the stated murder rate of 8.6 per 100,000 residents, the back-calculated population would be 802,300 (rounded). However, applying the same calculation to the total number of (UCR defined*) reported** rapes (342) and the stated rate of 55.5 (per 100,000), the back calculated population totals just 616,200 (rounded). ???

How can that possibly be? Are they not using the same population total figures for both crime-rate calculations? [I’ve always been suspicious of the accounting procedures used by the UCR – and this certainly erodes my confidence even more].

If the reported total for reported rapes is applied to the calculated total population based on the murder totals, the calculated rate of rape per 100,000 residents would be 42.6

Applying the same calculations to the 2009 numbers, I calculated a total population of 776,700, and a “rape” rate of 42 per 100,000.
2010’s UCR numbers, in the same calculations gives a population of 804,300, and a rape rate of 39.4 per 100,000.

* The UCR reports the number of “Rapes” to include not only completed rapes (including statutory), but also attempted rapes and sexual assaults in their tally.

** unlike the “Murder” category, wherein an actual dead body is required to prove the crime actual occurred, the “Rape” category (and all it’s constituent numbers) are based on the number of crimes REPORTED that cannot be (quickly) proven to have not occurred.
These two additional considerations regarding the UCR’s “Rape” category serve to make their published total a very unreliable (perhaps even specious) number. Not only does it cover a wide-range of assaults which can be ascribed a sexual nature, as well as consensual acts statutorily defined as rape; but it cannot even hope to account for either reports of crimes which did not occur (false report) nor the number of actual sexual crimes which are not reported to police.

Biden is, of course, dead wrong on the numbers. And, it appears both by the UCR’s numbers and the ones I calculated that the rate of reported rapes has actually gone down.

Based on that, one could (logically) argue that a further reduction in the number of police officers would be expected to lead to further decreases in the rate of rapes.

Oct 21, 2011, 11:49:00 AM
billy williams said...

Well,What do you expect from a guy who drafted the violence against women act(VAWA)?

Oct 23, 2011, 2:26:00 AM

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