Overall Crime is Down in Idaho but Violent Crimes are UP

The Idaho State Police released a new report that reflects updated crime statistics in the gem state. The national Uniform Crime Reporting Program started back in 1929 and is something that state and local police update annually.

For Idaho there is some good news and some bad news for how we are doing with crime when comparing 2019 and 2020 numbers.

Fortunately the latest report shows that crime was over all down in 2020 compared to 2019. I am not trying to take away from that being a good thing, but wouldn't that be expected with the pandemic? Since most people were more secluded and there was a lot less 'out and about' happening with more home time for everyone. At least certain crimes would be down due to that.

While it is good that overall crime was down percentage wise, according to the report crime was down about 2.8% from 2019 to 2020 but, and here comes the bad part, unfortunately there has been an increase in violent offenses and a disturbing rise in hate crimes.

As the report continues the stats get more alarming. Violent crime was up almost 8 percent. Hate crimes really jumped in the gem state. With a staggering 42% rise in hate crimes being reported in Idaho. There was fifty-four hate crimes reported in 2020, nearly double those reported in 2019.

Other not so good stats show that for Idaho animal cruelty reports had a massive 58% increase from 2019. Human trafficking also had a huge jump with a 66% rise. The one that more than doubled though was extortion, up 128%.

While these numbers are yes, disturbing and troubling there is a small sigh of relief knowing that even with that, according to CBS2, Idaho still has one of the lowest crime rates in the country.