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Honest Q: how is crime rate measured? If police stopped enforcing laws against, say, shoplifting, and the rate of shoplifting did not change, would the crime ra
by Gaelan 7y ago
Honest Q: how is crime rate measured? If police stopped enforcing laws against, say, shoplifting, and the rate of shoplifting did not change, would the crime rate go down?
- munificent 7y agoYes, most crime rate statistics are based on reported crimes. This is particularly problematic in Seattle. Because many citizens now understand that police won't respond to minor crimes, especially property crimes, people just don't report them at all. In the past few years, I've personally experienced someone climbing a fence to enter my back yard, shitting in my alley, stealing property from my porch, pissing on my garage, stealing from my trash (multiple times). None of those will show up on crime statistics even though they are illegal because I didn't call in since I knew the cops didn't have the capacity to do anything.
- rdtwo 7y agoYeah since drug use is no longer a crime and since possession is legal the number of crimes is down. We could decrease the numbers even more if we fired the remaining police officers.