Murder Rate Declines in Every Region Except the South, Where Executions Are Most Prevalent

According to the F.B.I.‘s lat­est crime report released on September 15, the South is the only region in the coun­try that expe­ri­enced a rise in its mur­der rate in 2007. The FBI report­ed that the mur­der rate in the coun­try declined to 5.6 mur­ders per 100,000 peo­ple in 2007 from 5.7 in 2006, and the rate declined in the Northeast, the Midwest, and the West. In the South, how­ev­er, the mur­der rate increased from 6.8 in 2006 to 7.0 in 2007, the high­est rate among the four regions. The South con­sis­tent­ly has had the high­est mur­der rate among the four regions. 

The South also leads the coun­try in exe­cu­tions: 100% of the exe­cu­tions car­ried out in 2008 have been in the South and 86% of those car­ried out in 2007 were in this region. By con­trast, the Northeast has the low­est mur­der rate in the coun­try and the fewest num­ber of exe­cu­tions. The Northeast also expe­ri­enced the sharpest decline in its mur­der rate among the four regions, while car­ry­ing out no exe­cu­tions in 2006-08. The com­plete F.B.I. report can be found here.

(U.S. Department of Justice, F.B.I., ​“Crime in the U.S., 2007,” September 2008). See also Studies and Deterrence.