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FAQ Listing
You no longer have to order paper copies of BJS reports released prior to 1995. More than 450 BJS publications that were previously available only through postal mail are now accessible from the BJS website. To view a complete list of titles now available online, please view BJS Publications Prior to 1995. All BJS publications are free to download from the BJS website.
Many surveys have a specific margin of error because all of the questions are asked of every person. For example if you ask an opinion question all of the respondents in the sample, everyone can give an opinion. The margin of error is different for different crimes and different findings in NCVS because questions are asked only of people who are victims of those crimes. There is a large margin of error around statistically rare crimes, such as rape/sexual assault. The margin of error is smaller around crimes which occur more frequently, such as property theft. Within a crime category such as violent crime, the margin of error around specific characteristics such as hospitalization may be larger than that for overall violent crime, since the estimates are based only on violent crime victims who experienced that characteristic.
UCR stands for the Uniform Crime Reporting Program, a project of the FBI. You can learn more about the UCR program on the FBI website.
We develop national estimates from sample cases of interviews with victims. We take the data we get from these interviews and weight it to represent the nation as a whole. All of the published data from the survey represent weighted estimates. When the national estimate is based on 10 or fewer actual sample cases, we make note of this and encourage caution in interpreting results.
According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) Law Enforcement and Management Administrative Statistics (LEMAS) 2003 survey, local police departments operated about 243,000 cars, or 52 cars per 100 officers. Sheriffs’ offices operated 118,000 cars, or 66 per 100 officers; and the 49 primary state law enforcement agencies operated 49,000 cars, or 85 per 100 officers.
The largest number of federal officers performed criminal investigation and law enforcement duties (38%). The next largest category was police response and patrol (21%), followed by corrections and detention (16%), inspections related to immigration or customs laws (16%), court operations (5%), and security and protection (4%).
The NCVS is designed to measure crime on a yearly basis. Criminologists have many theories about what causes crime rates to go up or down. There is no consensus among criminologists or others about the causes of crime or changes in crime rates. You may wish to read some of the literature in the criminology field to obtain more information about differing ideas on this topic.
The NCVS measures violent and property crime experienced by victims in the United States. This includes—
Violent crimes of rape or sexual assault, robbery, aggravated or simple assault.
Personal theft.
Property crimes of household burglary, motor vehicle theft, and theft.
Routine supplements address: identity theft, stalking, and contacts between the police and the public.
No, kidnapping is not a crime that is covered by the NCVS.
On average, local police officers were required to complete about 1,100 hours of training compared to about 1,000 hours for campus police. Campus police departments (30%) were more likely to have a college requirement for new officers than local police (20%). Campus police departments were also more likely than local police departments to assess recruits’ community relations skills prior to hiring. Community relations skills included problem-solving skills (campus police 58%, local police 37%), understanding cultural diversity (campus police 57%, local police 16%), and conflict management (campus police 42%, local police 11%).