FINAL_P_DVM
2025-12-02
What Factors Influence Crime in Chicago
Introduction
My name is Gianna Hunsche, and I am a second-year American Government major at the University of Virginia. I am also a native Chicagoan, and many people outside of Chicago are convinced that I am from a war zone. Chicago is notorious for its crime, and has become an example of corruption that many politicians use when discussing the topic. However, according to US News, Chicago doesn’t even crack the top 25 for most dangerous cities in America, and Alexandria(home to many of my college friends skeptical of my hometown) actually is much higher ranked. This is not what the news cycle says however, and I grew up listening and watching to stories about the havoc wrecking the streets just 20 miles east of me. As a child, this terrified me. Now that I am older, however, I realize that I have actually never seen any heinous crimes committed in my home city. As I experience more of the world, I have become tired of the notion that Chicago is as bad as the critics say, and there has been a substantial effort put into the city to reduce the crime rate. This encouraged me to research police spending into the city, trends over time, geographically where more crime is committed in the city, and how Chicago stacks up to other major cities to see if what the media says is statistically sound.
Questions
How does police spending correlate to different crime types in Chicago within the past decade?
How does Chicago compare to other major cities in the United States?
How has crime in Chicago evolved throughout the decade?
Which areas of Chicago are impacted by crime?
Time of year
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Before we analyze years, it is important to look at when in the year each crime is committed. The following data was constructed with just the most recent years, 2023 and 2024, to allow me to see when each crime is committed during the years. It is undeniable by the data that a substantial amount of arrests happen during the summer months. PBS gives a great outline of why this trend occurs, citing school being out allowing for more interaction between students and families, as well as more time for recreational activities. With this comes more opportunities to use substances. Further, PBS writes that several studies have linked warm weather with worse tempers. I can attest that the summers in Chicago are brutally hot, whilst the winters are freezing cold, therefore it is much easier to commit crimes during these summer months.
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## [35] "Untitled.Rmd" "Zotero"This plot is an interactive Shiny plot that displays a map of Chicago, and where specifically crimes in Chicago occur. Further, the user can filter by crime to see which crime is more prevelant geographically. These data points are from the stratified sample, so although the numbers are only 10% of what the actual data points are, they allow for a trend to be observed of crime across the city.
In this graph, I am going to be focusing mainly on the five prevelent crimes discussed above. Overall, it seems that there is an even distribution of crime across Chicago, with slightly more crime coming from the south side (where the infamous “O Block” is).
Theft seems to be committed much more frequently on the inner loop of Chicago, but is relatively distributed across the city. However, battery is much different, and most of the data points are concentrated onto the south side of the city. Although not as dramatic, a similar trend can be seen with criminal damage. Assault also happens most frequently on the South side, but the inner city has frequent amounts as well. Must similar to theft, deceptive practices are dispersed across the city with a concentration on the loop area.
Other interesting trends to note is that prostitution arrests occur more on the north sides of the city. Further, homicide rates are much more frequent in the South, and a neighboring suburb of the loop called Oak Park.
This data displays that although the common narrative(and something I have been warned of my whole life) is that the south side of Chicago is incredibly dangerous compared to the rest of the city, the overall crime rates are relatively distributed. However, the south side trends to have more crime.
Police Spending in Chicago and Crime Types
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The following visualization is from a data set of arrests made in Chicago from 2013-2025, and highlights the change in spending related to the change in different primary crime types. The data used was stratified by primary type and cut down to allow Tableau to publish it, and then multiplied again to provide a valuable trend and accurate numbers.
https://public.tableau.com/views/DVM_FP_1/Sheet1?:language=en-US&publish=yes&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link
Here is a link to the interactive portion of the graph
The graph above displays trends of crime rates in Chicago alongside police spending. As shown in the graph, from the years of 2013-2020, crime was on a steady decline before the COVID-19 pandemic, with a sharp decline during the pandemic and a sharp increase in the following years. It may be unnerving to see crime sharply increase between 2021-2023, however context is important when analyzing. When strict lock-down measures were in effect, no one was outside, and crime activity was subdued nationwide.
When looking at 2023-2024, crime has returned to its pre-pandemic numbers, and is still declining. Police spending has gone up in these years, and more officers are being hired as well. The crime rates here have a negative correlation with police spending, as Chicago has increased their funding towards public safety. Although correlation does not prove causation, it is a good sign that the measures that Chicago is putting in place are displaying a decrease in criminal activity.
When breaking it up by crime, however, the trends become much less clear.
Concentration of Crime by Primary Type
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https://public.tableau.com/views/DVM_FP_2/Sheet2?:language=en-US&publish=yes&:sid=&:redirect=auth&:display_count=n&:origin=viz_share_link
The interactive piece can be viewed here
The graph above (best viewed in full screen) highlights what crimes are the most frequent during this time period. Theft specand battery are by far the most frequently committed, followed by criminal damage, assault, and deceptive practice. By using these graphs in tandem, we can visualize if Chicago’s police spending correlates to a reduction in their biggest crime areas. According to the first graph, theft rates declined during COVID, but have been steadily increasing since. An important note, however, is that the rate of theft has not returned to its pre-pandemic levels. The same story is true with battery. Criminal trespassing, however, decreased during COVID and has stayed at half of the arrests made before the pandemic, a very positive trend that seems to be continuing as the 2025 reports become available.
The numbers around assault tells a different story. Before the pandemic, assault numbers were rising and plateauing before 2020. Since 2020 the assualt rates have exceeded their pre-pandemic numbers. However, it is important to note that these statistics are for arrests, not for calls or instances. There is a scenario where citizens(particularly women) feel more empowered to report assaults that occur. This is speculation though, and there could be many other variables for the increase not accounted for in this data set. Finally, deceptive practices peaked in 2018, and have been declining steadily since, seemingly not impacted by COVID.
When looking individually at each, there are other interesting trends. Motor vehicle theft has skyrocketed between the years of 2021-2023, but had a sharp decline in 2024.
Comparing other cities
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This graph displays all of the cities over 400,000 people, and their murder rates associated. I often get told by my friends in college to watch my back, and that Chicago is one of the most dangerous places in the US. The data, however, shows that Washington DC is ironically a much more dangerous place to return to after break. Chicago is ranked 10th based on 2015 data. Baltimore is number one, followed by Detroit, then Milwaukee. I used 2015 data because this is when I started to be terrified as a kid, and started to internalize the danger around me. However, when I told my parents and friends I wanted to move to DC, there was no notion of crime brought up as a concern. Chicago was highly ranked in crime during this time, but as more community efforts are put into the youth of Chicago, these trends will hopefully change in the future.
Violent crime, however, paints a surprising story. Chicago is 17th for violent crime out of US cities about 400,000 people, which was much lower than I was expecting. I worked in a government office where I was told frequently that people were migrating out to places like Nashville(like my parents are doing), because of the crime in Chicago. I was very surprised to learn that during this time period, Nashville was among the top ten of violent crimes per 100k people in the city. Chicago needs to focus more on outreach to their general public to make them feel safe.
Trust in police
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Above displays the feelings about police out of 100 displayed by individuals in Chicago, broken apart by race. This graph is also in colors that are friendly to those with colorblindness, as most graphs above are a uniform color. White and Asian individuals trust police more, whilst Black and Hispanic individuals have a lower score. This reflects a broader trend of disproportionate police brutality against minorities. Minorities not trusting police officers as much is a problem, as they might be more nervous to report and mistrusting of those that should be there to help them.
I was surprised that there was not a major difference between gender, with women only slightly more mistrusting of police officers.
## [1] "Applications" "BadPlot1.html"
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## [5] "Chicago_Crimes_SAMPLE.csv" "classwork9:4.Rmd"
## [7] "crime by month" "Desktop"
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## [11] "DVM_ICA09.Rmd" "FINAL_DVM_files"
## [13] "FINAL_DVM.html" "FINAL_DVM.Rmd"
## [15] "Final_project.html" "Final_project.Rmd"
## [17] "Gianna Hunsche Resume.pdf" "HW_3_DVM.html"
## [19] "HW_3_DVM.pdf" "HW_3_DVM.Rmd"
## [21] "ICA_09.Rmd" "Library"
## [23] "maps_outline.Rmd" "mapsss.Rmd"
## [25] "minecraftskin.png" "Movies"
## [27] "Music" "Pictures"
## [29] "Public" "Raw Data and Findings-PLAP 3370.pdf"
## [31] "test.html" "test.log"
## [33] "test.Rmd" "test.tex"
## [35] "Untitled.Rmd" "Zotero"This plot is an interactive Shiny plot that displays a map of Chicago, and where specifically crimes in Chicago occur. Further, the user can filter by crime to see which crime is more prevelant geographically. These data points are from the stratified sample, so although the numbers are only 10% of what the actual data points are, they allow for a trend to be observed of crime across the city.
In this graph, I am going to be focusing mainly on the five prevelent crimes discussed above. Overall, it seems that there is an even distribution of crime across Chicago, with slightly more crime coming from the south side (where the infamous “O Block” is).
Theft seems to be committed much more frequently on the inner loop of Chicago, but is relatively distributed across the city. However, battery is much different, and most of the data points are concentrated onto the south side of the city. Although not as dramatic, a similar trend can be seen with criminal damage. Assault also happens most frequently on the South side, but the inner city has frequent amounts as well. Must similar to theft, deceptive practices are dispersed across the city with a concentration on the loop area.
Other interesting trends to note is that prostitution arrests occur more on the north sides of the city. Further, homicide rates are much more frequent in the South, and a neighboring suburb of the loop called Oak Park.
This data displays that although the common narrative(and something I have been warned of my whole life) is that the south side of Chicago is incredibly dangerous compared to the rest of the city, the overall crime rates are relatively distributed. However, the south side trends to have more crime.
Conclusion
Overall, I was very surprised at the information I learned. I am excited that crime in Chicago is reducing, and I hope that trend continues, as I have loved growing up there. These visualizations display the differences in crime types in the city, where they are located, and police spending. Further, the graphs display how different groups in the community feel about the community servants employed to keep them safe. I hope that these data points displayed that Chicago is not the war torn city that many paint it out to be, although it has issues it must work on.
Sources:
https://catalog.data.gov/dataset/crimes-2001-to-present
https://projects.csgjusticecenter.org/tools-for-states-to-address-crime/50-state-crime-data/
Chicago police data:
https://igchicago.org/information-portal/data-dashboards/city-of-chicago-active-employees-overview/ https://www.chicagomag.com/city-life/august-2013/cpd/ https://www.chicago.gov/city/en/depts/mayor/press_room/press_releases/2016/february/chicago-police-departments-recruitment-campaign-results-in-71--i.html https://www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/depts/dhr/supp_info/JobClassification/8-2017_SALARY_SCHEDULES_FOR_SCHEDULE_A.pdf
https://www.civicfed.org/civic-federation/blog/city-chicagos-public-safety-expenditures https://www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/depts/obm/supp_info/2013%20Budget/2013Overview.pdf
https://www.chicago.gov/content/dam/city/depts/obm/supp_info/2023Budget/2023-OVERVIEW.pdf
Sources used in text:
https://realestate.usnews.com/places/rankings/most-dangerous-places
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/why-shootings-and-violence-increase-in-the-summer-months