FBI quietly revises crime statistics and reveals rise in violent crime

The FBI quietly revised the U.S. crime statistics to show an increase in violent crime.

An investigation by RealClearInvestigations found that the FBI updated its 2022 crime statistics in September, showing that rather than a 2.1% drop in violent crime as originally reported, the United States actually experienced a 4.5% rise in violent crime. The new dataset showed thousands more murders, rapes, robberies, and aggravated assaults.

The more than 6 percentage point change is unprecedented in recent FBI statistic reporting, William & Mary professor Carl Moody told the outlet.

“I have checked the data on total violent crime from 2004 to 2022,” he said. “There were no revisions from 2004 to 2015, and from 2016 to 2020, there were small changes of less than one percentage point. The huge changes in 2021 and 2022, especially without an explanation, make it difficult to trust the FBI data.”

The only announcement of the change was a single footnote in the 2023 crime statistic report, where the agency acknowledged, “The 2022 violent crime rate has been updated for inclusion in CIUS, 2023.”