This annual BJS Bulletin summarizes 1993 findings from the redesigned NCVS and presents the first tabulations of 1992 data based on the redesigned survey, an ongoing survey of households, each year interviewing about 100,000 persons in 50,000 households. In 1993, U.S. residents age 12 or older experienced a total of 43.6 million crimes--nearly 11 million violent victimizations and over 32 million property crimes. There were 52 violent victimizations per 1,000 persons and 322 property crimes per 1,000 households. Violent crimes (a quarter of the total that victims described) include rape and sexual assault, robbery, and both aggravated and simple assault (from the victimization survey), and homicide (from crimes reported to police). Property crimes are comprised of burglaries, motor vehicle thefts, and thefts of other property. Improved NCVS survey procedures and a revised questionnaire now enable BJS to count crimes that were excluded or unreported in previous years. Of the 43.6 million criminal victimizations that victims described in 1993, 10.9 million were rapes, robberies, or assaults:
Violent victimization rates, the number of crimes during 1993 per 1,000 persons age 12 or older, included: Victims sustained a rape or some other non-rape injury in over 2.6 million incidents in 1993; about 29% of the robberies involved injury.
- 2 rapes or attempted rapes
- 1 sexual assault
- 4 robberies with property taken
- 3 assaults with serious injury.
Males, blacks, and the young were more likely than others to experience violent crime--
Persons in households with an income below $7,500 a year were over twice as likely as those from households with $75,000 or more to be victims of violence.
- City dwellers were robbed at more than 3 times the rate of rural residents.
- City dwellers' households were victimized by motor vehicle theft at almost 5 times the rate of rural households.
- An estimated 35% of the crimes described by victims were reported to law enforcement authorities.
- Violent victimizations had the highest reporting rate, 42%, compared to 27% of personal thefts and 34% of household property crimes.
- 1 in 16 males and 1 in 23 females
- 1 in 15 blacks and 1 in 20 whites
- 1 in 8 persons age 12 to 15 and
- 1 in 179 persons age 65 or older.