In another blow to the Motor City’s tarnished image, Detroit pushed past St. Louis to become the nation’s most dangerous city, according to a private research group’s controversial analysis, released Sunday, of annual FBI crime statistics.
The study drew harsh criticism even before it came out. The American Society of Criminology launched a pre~emptive strike Friday, issuing a statement attacking it as “an irresponsible misuse” of crime data.
The 14th annual “City Crime Rankings: Crime in Metropolitan America” was published by CQ Press, a unit of Congressional Quarterly Inc. It is based on the FBI’s Sept. 24 crime statistics report.
The report looked at 378 cities with at least 75,000 people based on per-capita rates for homicide, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary and auto theft. Each crime category was considered separately and weighted based on its seriousness, CQ Press said.
Last year’s crime leader, St. Louis, fell to No. 2. Another Michigan city, Flint, ranked third, followed by Oakland Calif.; Camden, N.J.; Birmingham, Ala.; North Charleston, S.C.; Memphis, Tenn.; Richmond, Calif.; and Cleveland.
The study ranked Mission Viejo, Calif., as the safest U.S. city, followed by Clarkstown, N.Y.; Brick Township, N.J.; Amherst, N.Y.; and Sugar Land, Texas.
CQ Press spokesman Ben Krasney said details of the weighting system were proprietary. It was compiled by Kathleen O’Leary Morgan and Scott Morgan, whose Morgan Quitno Press published it until its acquisition by CQ Press.
The study assigns a crime score to each city, with zero representing the national average. Detroit got a score of 407, while St. Louis followed at 406. The score for Mission Viejo, in affluent Orange County, was minus 82.
Detroit was pegged the nation’s murder capital in the 1980s and has lost nearly 1 million people since 1950, according to the Census Bureau. Downtown sports stadiums and corporate headquarters, along with the redevelopment of the riverfront of this city of 919,000, have slowed but not reversed the decline. Officials have said crime reports don’t help.
Detroit Deputy Police Chief James Tate had no immediate comment on the report. But the mayor of 30th ranked Rochester, N.Y.. an ~police chief himself, said the study’s authors should consider the harm that the report causes.
“What I take exception to is the use of these statistics and the damage they inflict on a number of these cities,” said Mayor Robert Duffy, chairman of the Criminal and Social Justice Committee for the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
The rankings “do groundless harm to many communities,” said Michael Tonry, president of the American Society of Criminology.
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Thak you AP News
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Oh dear…I have a friend who is an Investigator for the City of Detroit…I truly hate to think of him out there…I hope he retires soon. Be safe, my friend.
~The Baby Boomer Queen~
November 23, 2007 at 12:42 pm
STOP CRYING and accept responsibility Chief Cummings!
Oh I know – you’re right – Detroit is only Number 2, not number 1!
Grow up and be a Chief and do your job! Detroit is NUMBER 1 – and is dangerous and is a Hell hole and no one but drug dealers step into the city after sundown!
November 23, 2007 at 12:16 pm
Hello Nick…
OUCH that hurts…I hope someone sends the Cheif my blog…
It sounds like the “OK Coral” up there, folks.
NRA should be very popular there.
Good luck Detroit people.
~The Baby Boomer Queen~
December 28, 2007 at 12:13 am
I would just like to say, that I have lived in Detroit for 37 years and, yes it is not the best city in the world, but it is not what the media portrays it to be. Around ten percent of the people cause all the problems in the city, which in turn, is roughly about 90 thousand. Taking that into account, please believe that 90 percent of the residents are tax paying, law abiding citizens. If I lived in a city with only a hundred people, and 10 of them were not upstanding citizens, I would feel adequately safe. Take in mind that the city has almost a million people, and that 800 thousand of them are good people.
January 3, 2009 at 12:54 pm
I am not surprised at all that Detroit became the most dangerous city in the U.S. I grew up on the east side of Detroit and it has gotten worse as the years passed. I remember attending middle school full of violence. Neighborhoods are being robbed in the daylight and it is very unsafe for residents even to walk down the street. Every time I visit Detroit I always fear of being robbed because it has happened to me once I was living there. The city is filled with corruption starting with the mayor and also the police department. When residents needs help in time of Danger the police takes an hour or more to come to the scene. It’s terrible in Detroit.