Uncovering the Complexities of Crime Measurement: Examining the Uniform Crime Reporting System and National Incident-Based Reporting System

09//22

The United States currently has two measuring tools that Identify crime. UCR which stands for Uniform Crime Reporting. The other is NIBRS which stands for National Incident-Based Reporting System. Uniform Crime Reporting or UCR did not accurately gather many details of the crimes that had been carried out. So, the FBI created the National Incident-Based Reporting System to collect important information about the crimes being committed. “including information on victims, known offenders, relationships between victims and offenders, arrestees, and property involved in crimes.” (FBI 2018). This information is essential so that police and federal agencies can analyze crimes. With such information, agencies can better plan for the crimes in their area. They can better prepare themselves to benefit the communities. They can campaign on cybercrimes if its big in a certain area. Two issues come to mind, the first being that NIBRS has only been mandatory for agencies since January of 2021. This is still new to certain agencies that might not have implemented a reporting system in the past. The second issue is false information due to certain grouping crimes. East Spencer Police Department in East Spencer, North Carolina, reported that specific reports are classified wrong. “The way the reporting system has been set up, until now, has meant non-criminal deaths (natural causes or overdoses, for example) have been classified as homicides. And that is wrong, said Police Chief John Fewell. East Spencer has had zero homicides in the last two years.” (Strillacci, E. 2022). I believe that the FBI needs to reevaluate the information that is gathered and reclassify or classify data. Cybercrimes are a bit more complex, and even if these tools are available, they need to be collected correctly in order to uncover significant issues that might be missed.

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References

FBI. (2018, September 10). National Incident-Based Reporting System NIBRS. FBI. Retrieved September 11, 2022, from https://www.fbi.gov/services/cjis/ucr/nibrs
Strillacci, E. (2022, August 15). East Spencer Police Address State Reporting Issue. Salisbury Post. Retrieved September 11, 2022, from https://www.salisburypost.com/2022/08/16/east-spencer-police-address-state-reporting-issue/