Criminal Investigation (Week # 7) Discussion Question

As crime rates in the United States escalate , solvency of individual incidents may not be enough . Law Enforcement Authorities must be able to develop strategies for addressing future events by means of studying the past . Statistical compilation systems like that of the Uniform Crime Report (UCR , the National Incident-based Report System (NIBRS ) and the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS ) have played a crucial role in the furtherance of this goal . Throughout the following we will examine the specific aspects of each system , differences in relation to one another as well as accuracy issues

that may arise

1927 brought the initial development of the Uniform Crime Report (UCR ) through the ideologies of The International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP . Now maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI , the primary goal of the UCR is to generate crime statistics , as they pertain to individual geographical locations , by local reporting of crime as to seriousness , frequency and pervasiveness whether or not an arrest has occurred . Criminology Units , Legislative platforms and Social Science Services find great benefit in this type of reporting as their research and planning processes can be supported by the input data . Compilations of these statistics are posted annually via publications such as Crime in the United States , Hate Crime Statistics ' and Law Enforcement Officers Killed and Assaulted Additionally , preliminary reports are published semi-annually Currently 17 ,000 agencies are included in the collaboration of UCR generated statistics (Federal Bureau of Investigation , n .d

Data collections for the UCR entails , the voluntary reporting by city , county , state , tribal and federal agencies in regards to criminal acts committed as know to police with or without arrest . The information gathered falls under strict federal guidelines and must adhere to uniform definitions of crime within a standardized scoring system . It is noteworthy to mention that when reporting , law enforcement officials must follow the crime definitions as determined in the UCR Handbook , and not within the scope of their state statutes Under the guidelines as set forth in the handbook , all data reported is required to be classified as one of two categories , Part I or Part II Offenses . Part I offenses include felonious homicide , rape , arson burglary , robbery larceny-theft , auto theft and aggravated assault Part II offenses , with the exception of traffic offenses , cover all crimes not mentioned in Part I . These reports are submitted monthly to mandated repositories within the agency 's respective state . Reports are then forwarded to the Federal UCR Program , reviewed for accuracy and reasonableness , then input into a national database (Federal Bureau of Investigations , n .d

In 1985 , the FBI enhanced reporting capabilities and analyses systems by introducing a summary level data collection system known as the National Incident-based Reporting System (NIBRS . Reporting data in the NIBRS is a partnered effort between FBI , local , state , federal agencies and professional organizations . Distinct aspects of the NIBRS are much expanded offense categories , a multi-level and incident-based reporting . Incident-based reporting systems allow for the input of detailed data unique to...