Chicago reported more murders than any other U.S. city in 2012, with 500 homicides, statistics revealed, significantly more than the 419 recorded in New York City.
The two cities switched places from their 2011 rankings, when New York reported 515 homicides, compared to 431 in Chicago, according to official 2012 statistics released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation earlier this week.
The total estimated violent crime was 386.9 offenses per 100,000 inhabitants, while the property crime rate was 2,859.2 offenses per 100,000 inhabitants. The FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program noted that the information was collected from statistical compilation of offense and arrest data shared by a total of 18,290 city, county, state, university and college, tribal, and federal agencies around the country.
In total, there were an estimated 1,214,462 violent crimes in the U.S. in 2012. Among the other notable statistics, there were an estimated 8,975,438 property crimes, which amounted to losses close to $15.5 billion.
“The FBI estimated that agencies nationwide made about 12.2 million arrests, excluding traffic violations, in 2012. The arrest rate for violent crime was 166.3 per 100,000 inhabitants, and the rate for property crime was 528.1 per 100,000 inhabitants,” the press release continued.
The Washington Post and other publications made a list of the 15 U.S. cities in 2012, which reported more than 100 murders each. Following Chicago and New York, the other cities on the list are: Detroit (386), Philadelphia (331), Los Angeles (299), Baltimore (219), Houston (217), New Orleans (193), Dallas (154), Memphis (133), Oakland (126), Phoenix (124), St. Louis (113), Kansas City (105) and Indianapolis (101).
