The FBI said murder rates in the US rose by 4.3 percent and rapes by 3.9 percent last year, but the numbers don’t include the crime-ridden cities of New York or Los Angeles.
In its annual analysis of crime in America, the FBI said their were about 22,900 murders in 2021, up from the 22,000 in 2020, which saw homicides soar by nearly 30 percent.
The FBI also saw 107,500 rape reports, nearly a 4 percent increase, but overall crime was reportedly down 1 percent since robberies fell by 8.2 percent and aggravated assaults remained at about the same level as the previous year.
Crime for New York City and Los Angeles, however, were absent in the FBI’s data as police in the city failed to submit their records to the bureau’s new collection systems, leaving the agency to fill in the blanks with estimates.
It comes as both cities contend with more than 300 murders so far this year, with overall violent crime running rampant.
The FBI’s annual crime report showed murders were up by 4.3 percent and rapes up by 3.9 percent last year in the US, but overall crime was reportedly down due to decreases in robberies and assaults. The data, however, is missing figures from NYC and LA
In 2020, the FBI announced a complete overhaul of its crime data collection system in order to improve the statistics about crime in the US.
However, about 9,700 police agencies had initially failed to submit their crime reports to the correct system by the March 14 deadline, with New York and Los Angeles failing to submit any data all together.
Analysts from the Brennan Center for Justice said the missing data has left the current image of crime in America muddied.
‘With so many agencies failing to report a full year of data for 2021, this year’s annual crime data release will have significant blind spots,’ the center said in a statement.
Richard Rosenfeld, a criminologist at the University of Missouri-St. Louis, told USA Today that the missing data and estimates would raise uncertainty on where the nation needs to focus crime-fighting legislation and funds.
‘Clearly, there is uncertainty surrounding the data released today,’ he said. ‘Let’s hope this is a one-year blip.’
Overall violent crime in the Big Apple is up 33.6 percent from last year
In the Big Apple, police reported 378 murders, down 13.5 percent from last year, but overall crime has spiked by 32.68 percent.
New York City has also seen rapes jump from 1.137 cases last year to 1,249 so far this year, a nearly 10 percent rise.
Robberies are also up 36.5 percent, and assaults and burglaries are up 15.9 and 31.5 percent respectively.
While homicides are down so far this year, murders in New York City remain at the top of the headlines, with the city seeing its latest killing last Thursday.
In the case, Peter Zisopoulos, 34, was charged with the ‘barbaric and completely unprovoked,’ stabbing death of Allison Russo-Elling, 61, a nearly 25-year veteran of the New York Fire Department who was among the 9/11 first responders.
Peter Zisopoulus, 34, is perp walked Friday after killing an on-duty EMT on Thursday
GRAPHIC WARNING: Zisopoulos is seen on surveillance camera stabbing Russo-Elling on Thursday afternoon in Queens
Allison Russo-Elling’s picture was released by colleagues on Thursday evening by the New York City Fire Department detailing her long career as a front line worker
Russo-Elling was on her way to get food when Zisopoulous, who has history of schizophrenia, allegedly approached her and stabbed her in what authorities said was a random and completely unprovoked attack.
The victim was left splayed on the corner with a deep, lethal stab wound to her chest, as well as approximately 18 smaller stab wounds to the upper and lower chest.
Russo-Elling was a mother, grandmother and also worked with the volunteer ambulance corps in Huntington, Long Island, where she lived.
She joined the FDNY as an EMT in 1998 and became a lieutenant in 2016. She worked out of Station 49 in Astoria, Queens at the time of her passing.
She was a first responder to the September 11, 2001 attacks and was credited multiple times for her ‘bravery and her life-saving work,’ said Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanaugh.
Although murderers are less frequent this year, the city contends with daily reports of assaults, with this year seeing a high number of bizarre attacks in the subway.
On Sunday, two teenage girls were beaten up and robbed by a gang of women wearing neon green skin suits on a Manhattan subway, according to police.
The pair of 19-year-olds were waiting for the N train in Times Square at around 2.00am, when a group of at least six women in bright green costumes charged down the station stairs.
The teens backed away and chose to enter a separate train car than the group that was ‘loud and obnoxious,’ according to one of the girls’ mothers.
But the green-clad group poured into the train from every entrance and ultimately ‘jumped’ the two young women.
Both teenage girls were swung around, stomped and punched by the green-clad group on a New York City N train at Sunday around 2.00am
Onlookers did not attempt to intervene as the innocent girls were beaten and robbed, rather they recorded the incident
Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, murder has stayed stubbornly high, with the city’s police reporting 304 cases so far this year, the same as the previous year.
Most recently, Freddie Lee Trone, 40, was arrested for the fatal shooting of Philadelphia rapper PnB Rock at Los Angeles restaurant Roscoe’s Chicken & Waffles on September 13.
He was charged with one count of murder, two counts of second-degree robbery and one count of conspiracy to commit robbery.
His unnamed teenage son, who was arrested Tuesday, was charged with the same counts.
Before his death, the robber approached PnB Rock’s table and demanded items from the rapper, according to investigators.
The robber took items from the victim and fled in a car that was waiting in the parking lot, police said. Rock was pronounced dead at a hospital.
Philadelphia rapper PnB Rock performs at the 2018 Firefly Music Festival in Dover, Del., on June 16, 2018. The rapper, whose real name is Rakim Allen, was fatally shot during a robbery in South Los Angeles on September 12, 2022
This image released by the Los Angeles Police Department shows Freddie Lee Trone
The city also saw a notable case in August when ICU nurse Nicole Linton, 37, was charged with six counts of murder after she crashed her car into five vehicles at 100 mph.
The collusion left a pregnant mother, her unborn child, one-year-old son and four others dead, as well as eight people injured.
While rape has fallen by more than 13 percent in LA, robberies have risen by 16.3 percent, with aggravated assaults also up 1 percent.
Overall crime in the city is up 4.3 percent from last year.
Just last week, the surveillance cameras in the city caught the moment a woman was struck in the head with a fire extinguisher in an unprovoked attack.
The unidentified woman was going out for morning coffee in West Los Angeles along Pico Boulevard when she was assaulted, according to her boyfriend.
Dan Steinberg, the boyfriend, said she saw the attacker shouting as he rode past her on an e-scooter before scurrying away.
A California man was caught on camera hitting a woman in the head with a fire extinguisher unprovoked in Los Angeles Saturday
Surveillance video shows the suspect returning, coming up from behind, and hurling the extinguisher at her head.
The victim fell to the ground, clutching the back of her head in obvious pain from the senseless blow.
The attacker got back on his scooter and moved on into traffic before getting away from the scene.
The video then shows the victim struggling to try and make it back up to her feet.
She lost consciousness and was eventually diagnosed with a concussion, according to Fox11.
Police investigate the scene of an early morning fatal shooting along in downtown Anchorage, Alaska, the state with the highest rate of violent crime in the U.S.
Police investigate the scene of an early morning fatal shooting in downtown Anchorage, Alaska. High crime rates in the state are an effect of men significantly outnumbering women, excessive alcohol consumption, and because lawmen are spread thin across the vast territory
The FBI’s report comes as a list by Texas-based firm Vela Law released its own report on violent crime in America.
Alaska, New Mexico and Tennessee have the highest rates of murder, rape and other violent crimes in the United States, while Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont have the lowest, according to the study released this week.
Alaska topped the list with 837.8 violent crimes committed per 100,000 people, according to a breakdown of FBI data from 2020 on rates for murder, manslaughter, rape, robbery and assault across the U.S.
It was followed by New Mexico, with 778.2 violent crimes per 100,000 people, then Tennessee, with 672.7 violent crimes per 100,000 people — all well above the national average of 398.5 crimes for every 100,000 people.
At the other end of the spectrum were three northern states — Maine, with just 108.6 violent crimes per 100,000 people, followed by New Hampshire (146.4 violent crimes per 100,000 people) and Vermont (173.4 violent crimes per 100,000 people).
A spokesman for the Vela Law firm said in a statement there were ‘considerable difference between the rates of recorded violent crime between the states that feature at the top and bottom of this list’.