PHOENIX — The FBI released its annual Uniform Crime Report on Monday, detailing violent crime throughout the United States.
The UCR takes crime data from local agencies, compiling the data to look at trends.
Overall, throughout the U.S. violent crimes were down. Arizona was no exception, seeing a reduction in murder, aggravated assault and robbery among other things.
However, Phoenix did see an increase of .4 percent in what the FBI classifies as rape.
When it comes to statistics, the FBI defines rape as, “The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.” The definition changed for the FBI back in 2013, to expand the definition. Local departments define rape based on the laws in their respective states.
While rape was slightly up clearance rates seem to have remained low. The FBI did not break down the "clearance rates" in other words how often a case was closed by an arrest or something more among cities, but by regions.
Arizona is part of the FBI's mountain region, which cleared only 25.6 percent of rape cases in 2018. The clearance rate was the lowest of any region in the U.S.
Phoenix numbers have been even lower.
A ProPublica report using FBI data found in 2016 Phoenix cleared just 11 percent of cases.
Phoenix police did not directly respond to questions about the report.