CHICAGO CRIME RATE

When reporting data, most cities report crime by types using the categories “Violent” and “Property.” Violent crime is defined as a crime in which an offender uses or threatens the use of force. This includes acts such as murder, rape as well as other crimes where force is used. Meanwhile, property crime is a crime conducted to obtain money, property, or some other benefit. In this table, you can see that property crime outpaces violent crime in Chicago by over 3 to 1 margin. When compared to the greater state of Illinois, Chicago sees violent crime at over double the rate as the rest of the state.

In this graph, it can be seen that Illinois rest slightly above the United States average for violent crime with the state coming in at 4.04 per 1,000 residents and the U.S. average at 3.81 per 1,000 residents. The reason for that differential is displayed when examining Chicago’s violent crime rate alone. Chicago violent crime rings in at 10.06 per 1,000 residents. 

With violent crime representing a variety of individual crimes, this graph breaks down the data into four primary categories. Murder represents the smallest category at 563 incidents. This takes place at a rate of 0.21 murders per 1,000 residents and is three times the Illinois state average. Rape occurs at 0.66 incidents per 1,000 residents and is only slightly higher than the state average. Meanwhile, robbery occurs in Chicago at over three times the state average with assault taking place at twice the rate of the state average. 

In this table, we can see the same breakdown, but compared against the United States average. As noted earlier, Chicago represents only 0.83% of the U.S. population, but accounts for 3.47% of the nation’s murders. It also accounts for 3.43% of the nation’s robberies while rape and assault in Chicago are higher than the national average, but not by as large a margin. 

This graph demonstrates that violent crime in Chicago is somewhat consistent, year after year. It does not a slight decrease in robberies from 2016 to 2018, but the proportion by which murder, rape, robbery, and assault take place is the same each year. 

Much like violent crime, Chicago continues to lead the way in property crime over the state and national averages. This graph displays the number of property crime incidents per 1,000 residents. Illinois as a state has a property crime rate of 19.33 per thousand residents, which is actually below the United States rate of 21.99 per thousand residents. However, Chicago rings in at 31.82 incidents per thousand residents to take the lead in the comparison. 

This table breaks down property crime by three major types and compares with the Illinois state average. Motor vehicle theft comes in at the lowest rate with 3.73 incidents per 1,000 residents. This is still nearly twice the rate of the state of Illinois. Burglary comes in at 4.30 incidents per 1,000 residents while theft occurs a 23.79 incidents per 1,000 residents. 

More in line with its population percentage, Chicago accounts for 0.95% of the nation’s incidents of burglary. Meanwhile, while only representing 0.83% of the U.S. population, Chicago accounts for 1.24% of incidents of theft and 1.35% of incidents of motor vehicle theft. 

Property crime has been fairly consistent over the past three years as evidenced by this graph. Incidents of theft has increased slightly from 2016 to 2018, but both burglary and motor vehicle theft have decreased slightly. Meanwhile, the proportion of each class of property crime relative to one another has remained the same.