Violent crimes consist of four major offenses, murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault. According to FBI’s uniform crime report, approximately 1,246,248 violent crimes occurred throughout our nation in 2010. Aggravated assault had the highest number of reported crimes in 2010 at 62.5%, followed by robbery, then forcible rape, and then murder at 1.2%. Violent crimes occurred mostly in the south throughout 2010 with a rate of 452.0 per 100,000 inhabitants. The northeast had the least amount of violent crimes committed with a rate of only 357.0 per 100,000 inhabitants. Violent crimes have decreased dramatically over the past few years. In 2006, violent crimes were estimated at about 1,440,000, whereas four years later in 2010 that number has gone down to about 1,246,248. If we look at the violent crime rate over the past nine years we can see a major decrease. In 2001, the rate was calculated at 504.5 as opposed to 2010 where the rate was calculated at 403.6. That’s a 20% decrease in all of violent crimes. The UCR also shows that violent crimes occur more in metropolitan areas over nonmetropolitan areas. 1,096,842 violent crimes were reported in metropolitan areas while 55,422 crimes were reported in nonmetropolitan areas.
According to the FBI forcible rape is defined as the carnal knowledge of a female forcibly and against her will. The FBI also include in their UCR attempt to commit rape by force or threat of force. Left out from the UCR are statutory rape and other sex offenses. If a male becomes victim to a sexual attack the FBI counts it as an aggravated assault of sex offense depending on the victim’s injuries. Forcible rape accounted for 6.8% of all violent crimes committed in 2010. In 2010 there was an estimated 84,767 forcible rapes reported to police. This estimate was 5% lower than the prior year’s estimate and 6.7% lower than the 2001 estimate. The amount of forcible rapes committed vary by region, in 2010 the south had the most rapes committed at 38.1% while the north east had the least at 18.1%. In metropolitan areas across the United States there were an estimated total of 69,746 forcible rapes committed. This number varies dramatically from nonmetropolitan areas where the estimated total of rapes committed was 6,654. This shows that forcible rapes happen mainly in areas where population is greater. 93% of all rapes reported were rapes by force, while the other 7% accounted for attempt or assaults to commit rape. By looking at the forcible rape rate over a 10 year period we can see that in 2001, the rate was 31.8