STUDIES: FBI Crime Report Shows Murder Rates Remain Higher in Death Penalty States

The U.S. Department of Justice released its annu­al FBI Uniform Crime Report for 2014, report­ing no change in the nation­al mur­der rate since 2013. In the Northeast, the region with the fewest exe­cu­tions, the mur­der rate declined 5.7%, from 3.5 to 3.3 per 100,000 pop­u­la­tion. The mur­der rate was 1.7 times high­er in the South, which car­ries out the most exe­cu­tions of any region. That region saw a 3.4% increase in the homi­cide rate, and its 5.5 mur­ders per 100,00 pop­u­la­tion remained the high­est rate of any region. Murder rates in the West and Midwest declined by 3.8% and 5.4%, respec­tive­ly. A DPIC analy­sis of weight­ed mur­der rates found that death penal­ty juris­dic­tions con­tin­ue to have a high­er mur­der rate than non-death penal­ty juris­dic­tions (includ­ing Washington, D.C.): 4.7 per 100,000 com­pared to 3.8 per 100,000. Ten of the eleven states with the high­est mur­der rates have the death penal­ty, while six of the eight low­est do not.

(“Crime in the United States, 2014″, U.S. Dept. of Justice (2015); DPIC analy­sis post­ed October 30, 2015). See Deterrence and Murder Rates.

Rates are num­ber of mur­ders per 100,000 persons.