Arrest in the United States, 1990-2010

October 2012:

Arrest in the United States, 1990-2010 NCJ 239423

Presents annual estimates of arrests in the United States covering the period between 1990 and 2010. Based on data collected by the FBI's Uniform Crime Reporting Program, this report expands the FBI's set of published arrest estimates to include offense-specific arrest estimates grouped by age, sex, and race. These breakdowns of arrests and arrest trends provide a detailed description of the flow of individuals into the criminal justice system over a long period. The national estimates represent arrests by state and local law enforcement agencies, and control for variations in sample coverage from year to year.
Highlights include the following:

• The number of murder arrests in the U.S. fell by half between 1990 and 2010. The adult and juvenile arrest rates dropped substantially in the 1990s, while both continued to fall about 20% between 2000 and 2010, reaching their lowest levels since at least 1990.
• There were 80% more arrests for drug possession or use in 2010 than in 1990. Even though the rate declined between 2006 and 2010, the arrest rate for drug possession or use in 2010 was still 46% above its 1990 level and was at levels similar to those seen between 1997 and 2002.
• The male arrest rate for larceny-theft in 2010 was about half of the rate in 1990. In comparison, the female arrest rate in 2010 was just 8% below its 1990 level. The female rate fell 25% between 1990 and 2000, remained constant for several years, then grew between 2005 and 2010 to erase most of the decline experienced in the 1990s.

..source.. by Howard N. Snyder, Ph.D. Bureau of Justice

Arrest in the United States, 1980-2009

Septrember 2011:

Arrest in the United States, 1980-2009 NCJ 234319

Introduction
This report presents newly developed national estimates of arrests and arrest rates covering the 30-year period from 1980 to 2009, based on data from the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reporting Program (UCR). By reviewing trends over the 30 years, readers can develop a detailed understanding of matters entering the criminal justice system in the U.S. through arrest.

The UCR collects arrest data from participating state and local law enforcement agencies. ese agencies provide monthly counts of their arrests (including citations and summons) for criminal acts within several o ense categories. In Crime in the United States, 2009, the FBI estimated that the state and local law enforcement agencies covered by the UCR made 13,687,000 arrests in 2009. Statistics in this report expand the FBI’s set of published arrest estimates to include estimates of arrests by age group, sex, and race within many o ense categories. These detailed breakdowns of arrests and arrest trends provide a unique understanding of the ow of individuals into the criminal justice system over a long period of time. Within a single o ffense category, arrest trends often differ substantially for males and females, juveniles and adults, and racial groups.

To interpret the arrest statistics presented in the report, readers are encouraged to review the FBI’s counting rules discussed in the Methodology. This report uses arrest rates rather than arrest counts to display 30-year trends, because rates control for changes in the size of the reference population over this time period. In addition, readers should review graph legends before studying the graphs because some arrest rates have been multiplied by a constant to make the trends more visible. In the graph legends throughout this report, American Indian/Alaskan Native is abbreviated as AIAN, and Asian/Pacific Islander is abbreviated as API.

In addition to this report, BJS has developed an online data access tool that enables users to generate graphs and tables of national trends in arrests and arrest rates for a large set of o ffenses and population subgroups. e online tool is available on the BJS website. is tool will enable policymakers, justice system professionals, advocates, the media, researchers, students, and the public to produce the specific information they need with little effort, information that is often not readily available or that cannot be found in any other resource. ..Source.. by Howard N. Snyder, Ph.D., BJS Statistician