The National Crime Recording Standards (NCRS)

The three methods by which crime is measured are the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), and self-reporting. While all prove to be a great way to measure crime, there are some limitations to each. For UCR, its limitations are probability, the possibility of someone witnessing the crime, or it being reported. This limitation proves that some crimes may be more underreported than others. For NCVS, it does not report some juvenile victimization. For example, anyone 12 or under will not be part of this survey. It does not gather information on certain important kinds of juvenile victimizations, such as the nonforcible sex offenses of statutory rape and incest. For Self-Report, its limitations

Recording a crime: When the police have decided to record a crime they will then need to decide how many crimes as well as what offences have been committed. An example of this is if there was a burglary and some car keys were taken from a house then the car was stolen it would mean there were two offences, a burglary and a theft. If there is only one victim and offender for the offences then only one crime would be recorded. If there are two or more victims then the crime will be recorded for each victim. The police are required to record crime at the earliest time possible.

Law enforcement agencies use three different sources to collect crime statistics. They use official statistics, victimizations surveys, and self-report surveys as their main sources of collecting data. The University of Texas at Arlington and the University of Texas at Austin both have pretty similar crime statistics.

The Uniform Crime Report (UCR) came into place in the year 1929 with an objective of creating a detailed report on the crimes in the United States of America. Since its inception, publication on different crimes have been made available every year, and crime data is now available for detailed analysis.

There have been numerous opinions as well as criticism on how crime should be measured in the United States. FBI, and U.S. Census are a few of the government agencies who utilize crime reporting methods such as Uniform Crime Reports (UCR), National Incident-Based reporting system (NIBRS), and National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). Each method is created in order to give us an estimation of crime rate, so the process to reducing it could begin. Looking at the history of each report, then review their similarities and their differences, to finally analyzing varies criticisms, will help in the understanding if these crime reporting methods are effective.

The Uniform Crime Reports can also be described as a summary reporting system (Criminal Justice Information Services Division, 2000. pg. 5). The National Incident-Based Reporting System is much more detailed in nature. When it comes to the offense recording, the hierarchy rule is used only in the UCR which only records one offense no matter if there were several crimes that occurred. However, the NIBRS records each crime even if they are part of one incident, therefore the hierarchy is not applied (Criminal Justice Information Services Division, 2000, pg. 13). UCR does not distinguish between completed and attempted crimes whereas the NIBRS does. When it comes to rapes, the UCR only classifies rapes against women where the NIBRS classifies rapes against men also (Rantala & Edwards, 2000, pg. 1). In collecting information on weapons, the UCR only collects it for murder, robbery, and aggravated assaults. The NIBRS collects weapon information on all crimes. Even though, both the UCR and NIBRS collects information on the 8 index crimes, the UCR only has another 21 offenses in contrast with NIBRS’s 49 offenses to collect information on. Under the hotel rule, the UCR only reports a theft at the hotel, whereas the NICRS also includes the detailed rooms at the hotel and also classifies storage facilities as part of this rule as well (Rantala & Edwards, 2000, pg. 5).

The UCR is also called Uniform Crime Report is a recording system that is provided by the Federal Bureau of investigation and the purpose for the UCR is to help law enforcement agencies to exchange information about reported crime (Meadows. PG 4). The NCVS, also known as National Crime Victimization is another source of victimization data and it also helps law enforcement to collect information about the victim and it tracks the crime of rape, robbery, assault, and larceny crimes.

The annual National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) has been the primary method for gathering data and providing these staggering statistics. The NCVS provides information gathered from the victim, which includes information on crimes that went unreported to the police. The Uniform Crime Report (UCR) is also a valid reference for gathering crime information within the United States. The UCR only has information regarding crimes that were reported to the police, as well as arrests. Both forums are used by the FBI. In addition, researchers use this information for their research. Even Taylor and

The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) stemmed from a mid-1980s report, is an incident-based reporting system (some states use a customized version) that is used by law enforcement agencies in the United States for the collecting and reporting of data on crimes that are known by police. NIBRS is the result of law enforcement thoroughly evaluating and modernizing the UCR (Uniform Crime Reports). The UCR, produced by the FBI, was initially developed by the IACP (International Association of Chiefs of Police) in 1931 in which police departments across jurisdictions could exchange information in regards to crime. Local, state and federal agencies generate NIBRS data from their

UCR or known as the Uniform crime reports is an annual report published by the FBI in the DOJ, which is meant to estimate most of the major street crimes in the United States.The main purpose of the UCR is basically to collect as many crimes or reliable crimes that come up as crime statistics so it can be used in our law enforcement administration. The Ucr is a very helpful tool for the law. The system was created in 1929. It provided information for criminologists,sociologists, and even the media. The Ucr mostly concentrates on assaults and robberies. The NIBRS or the national incident based reporting system is the system that the government uses for gathering data about recent or past crimes. The system has a lot of purposes but one of the main purposes’ is to evaluate the crimes associated with any current culture of violence theories.

The two major sources of crime data used in the United States remain The Uniform Crime Reports and The National Incident-Based Reporting System. Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) shows a statistical summary of crimes reported by the police each year. UCR was authorized in 1930 by Congress for the operation of compiling crime data. A reporting system in which police describe each offense in a crime incident including the data describing the offender, victim, and property is considered the National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS). NIBRS is put together by two groups: Group A and Group B. Group A consists of 22 specific crimes in reach of 46 offenses and 11 Group B offense categories exclusive for data reported for arrest.

In 1982 the National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) was implemented to improve the quality of crime data collected by law enforcement by capturing detailed

orting System fall under the Uniform Crime Reporting Program that provides information on crime all of the United States. This includes regions, states, counties, cities, towns, tribal law enforcement, colleges and universities. In this paper we will compare and contrast the two primary crime data sources used within the United States, the Uniform Crime Report and the National Incident-Based Reporting System. Before we do this, we will discuss each source individually and how it is used in Criminological research. The purpose of this study is to determine which source is lacking in function and which provides the best accurate information.

The NIBRS collects data on each single incident and arrest within 22 offense categories made up of 46 specific crimes which is known as Group A offenses. NIBRS is short for National Incident-Based Reporting System. It is a reporting system that is used by law enforcement agencies in the United States for collecting and reporting data on crimes. Local, state and federal agencies generate NIBRS data from their records management systems. NIBRS came about in the late 1970s because the law enforcement community called for a thorough evaluation of the UCR program to recommend an expanded and enhanced data collection system to meet the needs of law enforcement in the 21st century. NIBRS was developed because over the years, the UCR data evolved and law enforcement expanded its capabilities to supple crime information. South Carolina law enforcement was the first division to use the National Incident-Based Reporting system to make sure it worked and that it worked correctly.

The National Incident-Based Reporting System (NIBRS) has the same base idea as the UCR, the biggest difference is that the NIBRS is more updated and accurate, as well as it provides a lot more detail in its reporting than the UCR. For example the number of offenses made by one person are not limited when reporting and collecting data. Detail on each and every crime is reported, as well as the report making note of the difference of attempting and completing crimes. Not only can citizens still locate and identify crimes made in a certain neighborhood or area but they can also get accurate specific detail on the criminal events. One of the only disadvantages of NIBRS is that the statistics in the reports will not be completely current because there are some criminal events that will not get submitted until the next month, so some of the accurate information is a month delayed. (U.S. Department of Justice)