Pros And Cons Of Uniform Crime Reporting

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The uniform crime reporting, (UCR), system was developed in the 1920’s as a method to report criminal incidents based on jurisdictions throughout the United States. This system was formulated to help the government asses the nature of crimes and associate such crimes to particular geographical jurisdictions. The main idea of UCR was to provide law enforcement agencies as well as the FBI with relevant, objective and accurate statistics to keep the users of the UCR more informed about crime and criminal statistics and to aid in the possible development of better policies and assist in decision making regarding police action and productivity. UCR is a program in which city, state and federal law enforcement departments take part in. it provides …show more content…
Today, about 17,000 agencies report crime using UCR data. UCR has a number of strengths and weaknesses, but the strongest asset of the UCR system would have to be what it provides to the FBI. UCR provides the patterns of criminal activity throughout the United States. The patterns of crimes from each jurisdiction in the United States are assessed and reported annually. In addition to the crimes committed, these reports also include law enforcement personnel involved, crimes that have been cleared, suspects that have been arrested, and characteristics of homicides. The UCR data also provides the FBI with valid statistics regarding crime, so that government policies and police presence can be adjusted …show more content…
Some authorities feel that victimized people are less averse when overstating their wrongdoings. There is not a measure to accept if an individual record is accurate or false. Then again, there are likewise instances of under-reporting law violations, in which victimized people will be unable to recollect criminal acts as they happened. There are mixtures of explanations why individuals decide not to report law violations. A person may not think the wrongdoing that befell them is paramount, they might dismiss that incident like a person who was mugged but unharmed. The person in this case might feel it is not something that is deserving of reporting. Eventually, no dependable measure exists on the amount of unlawful acts that could be erroneously reported or of the amount of unlawful acts that could be underreported in the UCR