What crime?
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If a murder happens in the city, and we don't report it, was there really a crime?
But for the third consecutive year, Pittsburgh did not turn over its annual numbers to the system, including homicides and assaults, making it nearly impossible for police experts and citizens to get a true picture of crime in the nation from the FBI.
The Pittsburgh Bureau of Police is among hundreds of agencies across Pennsylvania that have been missing from the federal program, giving the state the rare distinction of having the lowest rate for participation in the country, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette has found.
“It’s an embarrassment,” said Beth Pittinger, director of Pittsburgh’s Citizen Police Review Board. “The people, our communities, if they want to know an accurate picture [of crime in Pennsylvania], they aren’t going to get it — it’s not there.”A data analysis by the Post-Gazette shows that just 11% of the state’s law enforcement agencies sent their data to the new system last year, leaving Philadelphia police as the only large municipal agency to share those figures with the FBI.
The lack of participation in the state – one of the nation’s most populous – not only creates gaps in detecting national trends but also raises concerns about police transparency, an issue that continues to drive debates across the country.
