The Uniform Crime Report (UCR) which is a compilation of criminal statics that has been submitted to the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) by local law enforcement agencies. The UCR is divided in two crime Indexes, Index I and Index II. Index I is commonly referred to as Index Offense, which consists of murder, rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny, and motor vehicle theft. The crimes of arson was added to the index crimes in 1979. Index II contains the other criminal offense except traffic violations, such as speeding tickets.
Unfortunately, there are two major setbacks of utilizing the UCR. Typically, information is submitted using the standard definitions and …show more content…
However, it is a term that most of my classmates should be familiar with. The dark figure of crime is discussed in most of the criminal justice classes, such as research methods. The term “dark figure of crime” is used by criminal justice practitioners to illustrate the number of committed crimes that is not reported to local law enforcement agencies. The analysis of the data by the UCR does not include crimes that is not report. Ultimately, undermines the accuracy of the data that has been collected and analysis. There is a large number of crimes that occur but are never reported for various reasons. An excellent example of a crime that goes unreported is assaults. The reason that this crime is not reported is due to the fear that has be instilled in the victim by the perpetrators. The perpetrator may tell the victim that he is going to kill her family, and she may believe him. As a result, the woman may not report the crime to save her family. Sometimes, information is reported but the incident is not documented by the officer. It could be that the officer was tried and did not feel like doing the long paper work that has to be typed. If the officer does not enter the information into the system, it cannot be sent to the FBI to be analyzed into the criminal data. The extract level of crime activity occurring in the United States will be difficult to determine as long as the dark figure of crime exists. (15 Sentences)
3. Why do crime victims sometimes fail or neglect to report crime to the police? How can this be