AP FACT CHECK: Crime stats don't back Trump's dire view

Crime stats don't back Trump's dire view

Crime figures are a malleable source of information.

Depending on what time period is compared, and which crimes are considered, they can be used to tell a tale of progress or setbacks.

According to FBI data , the national violent crime rate last peaked in 1991 at 758 reported violent crimes per 100,000 people.

The Major Cities Chiefs Association, a nonprofit that works with urban police chiefs, finds that violent crime reported by some urban police departments rose from 2014 to 2015, and homicides alone were up in 44 of the big-city and county police departments, by this count.

The FBI's annual Uniform Crime Report, the main source of data on crime, isn't a perfect measure because police departments voluntarily report their numbers and some departments may classify crimes differently.

[...] the decline seen in the FBI's numbers has been mirrored in another nationwide crime measure, the National Crime Victimization Survey published by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics.

EDITOR'S NOTE _ A look at the veracity of claims by public officials