Crime Ranking Methodology

Law Street’s Crime Team used the FBI’s four major violent crime categories – murders, aggravated assaults, robberies, and forcible rapes – to create a standard measure of violent-crimes-per-100,000 people among all cities reporting crime data to the FBI. This allows year-to-year and city-to-city comparisons. To derive the ratio, the total number of violent crimes reported to the FBI  is divided by the city’s population, with  the result then multiplied by 100,000. The formula for this calculation is shown below. Crime ratings were further broken down by population, with 200,000 used as the dividing point.

Violent Crime Rate = (Total Violent Crime in a City/City Population) x 100,000

Click here for all Law Street Crime data.

Click here to read more Crime in America coverage.

Kevin Rizzo

Kevin Rizzo is the Crime in America Editor at Law Street Media. An Ohio Native, the George Washington University graduate is a founding member of the company. Contact Kevin at krizzo@LawStreetMedia.com.