Thanks but I was truly interested in finding out where OP got these stats from, meaning did he also do a quick google search or does he just know these things.

Thanks but I was truly interested in finding out where OP got these stats from, meaning did he also do a quick google search or does he just know these things. I mentioned methodology in my post because that (to me) is the most important part of validating any statistics. My UG education was in a social science so I pay attention to those types of things. Stuff like this "Homicide as defined here includes murder and nonnegligent manslaughter which is the willful killing of one human being by another. The general analyses excluded deaths caused by negligence, suicide, or accident; justifiable homicides; and attempts to murder. " So we're saying vehicular manslaughter and shooting somebody in the head are the same while in reality they are completely different. Would you say that if you accidentally kill hit somebody and they die this is a murder? I wouldn't. But those cases get tacked on and divided and put through algorithms under the auspice of nurder. Additionally this "While many agencies report supplemental data on homicides, much of the data concerning offenders may not be reported because no suspects were identified. The most significant problem in using SHR data to analyze offender characteristics is the sizable and growing number of unsolved homicides contained in the data file. " So they guess based on what they do know, I have a problem with that. "In other words, offender profiles for unsolved crimes are estimated based on the offender profiles in solved cases matched on victim age, sex, and race; circumstances of the homicide; location of the homicide; and gun involvement; as well as year. All offender-based estimates were imputed using this procedure. " Those are only a few excerpts that cast doubt on the true validity of the DOJ stats. We have an obsession in this society with quantifying things, even when they can't really be put in to nice little statistics.