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ABSTRACT
Guided by both recent anecdotal speculation of and realized statistical spikes in homicide and violence in several major U.S. cities, this study presents results of an effort to empirically examine the nature and correlates of recent changes in homicide rates (i.e. 2012–2018) with particular attention to a spike in 2014–2016 in select U.S. cities. Data were derived from multiple sources using a unique mixed-methods approach. To measure the magnitude of changes in homicide rates in recent years, quantitative homicide data were collected from the Uniform Crime Reports, media articles, individual police department queries, Project Safe Neighborhood grantee sites, and the Major Cities Chiefs Association, Violent Crime Survey. Qualitative assessments were then captured from both academic experts as well as practitioners in the field relative to the possible correlates of these observed trends. Quantitative findings substantiate that homicide rates in select U.S. cities were increasing but variation was also found with rates in other cities having remained stable or even declining over the period studied. This work delineates the practical contours of these correlates and finds concordance of practitioner beliefs with research findings while providing a glimpse toward future actions in response to both real and perceived fluctuations.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes
1. Despite the substantial decline in homicide rates in the 1990s, the magnitude of the decline was still not as steep as the increase in homicides in the 1960s and 1970s (LaFree Citation1999).
2. Given this was not available at the time our research was conducted, we draw more on this recent special issue and empirical research in our discussion and conclusion sections.
3. We are unable to explicitly identify the source(s) of data in each city due to the promise of confidentiality when relying on our respective credentials and connections used to make the requests. In addition, specifying which cities’ data were obtained from cooperating police agencies might highlight those which did not, possibly limiting future access to such data.
4. Using a similar procedure, Rosenfeld (Citation2016) manually gathered 2015 homicide data from local police departments and news sources for the 56 large U.S. cities he used in his study on the 2014–2015 homicide increase.
5. Additional attempts were implemented when necessary.
6. Notably, many of our responses were generated from cities that had experienced recent upticks in homicide, and we note this as a limitation of our work.
7. The authors presented preliminary findings at the 2017 Annual American Society of Criminology conference for comment and additional insight from those in the audience. No new insights were gleaned from this approach, furthering our confidence in the findings presented here.
8. Consistent with UCR reporting standards, the homicide count and rate for Orlando include the 49 victims of the Pulse Nightclub shooting in June 2016.
9. The correct trend directions were produced via crowdsourcing for 54 of the 55 cities. Newark had been identified as having a 0.73 decreased homicide rate when in fact it slightly increased by 1.11 per 100,000 residents.
10. A word cloud of the entirety of the qualitative responses yielded little meaningful results, with placeholders and filler words being the most prevalent. For example, the word ‘homicide’ by far dominated in the word cloud. As a result, we pulled the specific explanations respondents provided and extracted the reasons they gave for recent homicides in their cities (i.e. the more substantive findings) to produce the current word cloud presented in Figure 4.
11. Expanded results available upon request.
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Ashley M. Mancik
Ashley M. Mancik is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Criminology and Criminal Justice at the University of South Carolina. Her primary research interests include homicide and violence, crime clearances, and quantitative methods, with a current focus on longitudinal trends in homicide. Her recent work in these areas has been published in Social Science Research, Journal of Interpersonal Violence, Homicide Studies, and Criminal Justice Review.
Shila René Hawk
Shila René Hawk is the lead data scientist and law enforcement expert at Applied Research Services, Inc. Her research interests include violence trends - tracking, causes, correlates, and responses.
John P. Jarvis
Dr. John P. Jarvis currently serves as the Chief Criminologist and Academic Dean of the FBI Academy at Quantico, Virginia. His academic and criminological work focuses on evidence-based policing strategies, crime analysis, crime trend research, and the initiation and support of various research efforts by local, state, and federal law enforcement.
Wendy C. Regoeczi
Dr. Wendy Regoeczi is Professor of Criminology at Cleveland State University. She also serves as the Director of CSU’s Criminology Research Center. She is the former editor of the journal Homicide Studies. Her research interests include homicide, domestic violence, sexual assault, criminal investigations, and gun violence prevention. Her publications have appeared in such journals as the Journal of Quantitative Criminology, Justice Quarterly, Journal of Forensic Sciences, Social Forces, and the Journal of Research in Crime & Delinquency. She is also co-author (with Terance Miethe) of Rethinking Homicide: Exploring the Structure and Process Underlying Deadly Situations, published by Cambridge University Press.