Nearly 40 percent of the 18,000 U.S. law enforcement agencies failed to report crime data to the FBI's database in 2021 after the transition to a new collection system. The transition creates huge gaps in national crime stats sure to be exploited by politicians, reports the Marshall Project. The missing data are not random — in some of the largest states like California, Florida and New York, most agencies did not report data.
The Marshall Project published a chart showing which agencies submitted data as of Feb.7, the deadline for local agencies to submit figurew for the 2021 fourth quarter report. Local agencies had until March 7 to submit data for the FBI's 2021 national crime report. Criminologists fear the missing data means the nation will not get reliable crime data for years to come. If a local police department did not report data to the FBI, it would also mean scholars, policy makers and the public cannot compare crime in their community with other places.