About | UCPD

In this Report

This report contains a summary of the crime statistics for the University of California for the calendar year 2016. It is divided into sections, one for each of the ten campuses and for the system as a whole. Each section contains charts and graphs allowing for an analysis of crime rates and trends over a period of years. Individual narrative reports provided by the police department on each campus are included.

Valid assessments are possible only with careful study and analysis of the range of unique conditions affecting each local law enforcement jurisdiction.

The reader is, therefore, cautioned against comparing statistical data of individual reporting units from cities, metropolitan areas or universities solely on the basis of their population coverage or student enrollment.

Crime

What is a crime?

A crime is an act specifically prohibited by law, or failure to perform an act specifically required by law, for which punishment is prescribed.

Felonies are serious crimes for which the offender can be sentenced to state prison.

Misdemeanors are less serious crimes for which the offender can be sentenced to various combinations of fines, probation, or county jail time.

Infractions are the least serious offenses, usually punishable by a fine.

How are crimes counted?

Each individual Police Department using the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program counts crimes at their respective University of California campuses. The UCR Program was conceived in 1929 by the International Association of Chiefs of Police. In 1930, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was given the responsibility of collecting and publishing this data on the national level. The UCR provides criminal statistics for use in law enforcement administration, operation, and management.

In California, the Criminal Justice Statistics Center (CJSC) of the Department of Justice under the Office of the Attorney General administers the UCR program. You may visit the CJSC site for additional information.

As part of this program, the University of California Police Department, and all law enforcement agencies throughout the state, report summary information to the CJSC on selected offenses. Offenses reported are classified by UCR definitions designed to eliminate differences among various states in penal code definitions of crimes. This information is incorporated in the Annual Report and is used by the CJSC to maintain several statewide data systems containing criminal justice statistical information as mandated by California law and to provide the interpretation, analysis and publication of that data.

The data is also used for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Crime in the United States Publications. The Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) selected offenses are referred to in the reports as "FBI Crime Index Offenses" and are often referred to as "Part I Crimes" You may visit the FBI site for additional information about the UCR and crime in the United States.

The FBI Part I Crime Offenses, selected by UCR because of their seriousness, frequency of occurrence and likelihood of being reported to the police are willful homicide, rape, robbery, all assaults (both simple and aggravated), burglary, all larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft and arson. Except for assaults and larceny-theft, UCR does not count misdemeanors and infractions.

In addition to the FBI Part I Crime Offenses, the University of California Annual Report provides information relative to “other offenses.” In this Annual Report, the University of California is using the UCR Part II Crimes as other offenses identified for reporting. These categories of offenses are defined by the UCR, though not reported in the FBI's annual Uniform Crime Report.

The University of California chose to use Part II Crimes in an attempt to indicate in a consistently defined manner the types of other offenses that occur on the University of California campuses. Many of the offenses are misdemeanors and infractions and include offenses such as weapons violations, drunkenness, drug offenses and sex offenses other than rape.

If you wish to see a more detailed comparison of specific crime activity, you may contact your campus of choice through their listed web link.

Definitions
Definitions of the offenses in both categories are listed in the glossary of this report. Generally, definitions of crimes remain consistent over the years, however, for the Annual Report we included the specific definitions of Part II Crimes.

Hierarchy Rule
Most crimes occur singly as opposed to many crimes being committed simultaneously. However, if several offenses are committed at the same time, only one is reported through UCR. For example, if one person were to enter a store, rob eight customers and kill the cashier, only the homicide would be reported. This is referred to as the hierarchy rule.

The hierarchy rule assigns a value to each of the crimes and requires that only the single most serious offenses be reported. Arson is the exception. Since arson frequently occurs in conjunction with other crimes reported in the UCR system, it was felt that valuable information would be lost using the hierarchy rule, therefore, arson is always reported.

The UCR system collects information in summary form, which shows one count for each offense reported. No distinction can be made as to the range of seriousness that can be present in most offenses.

Making Comparisons

Can jurisdictional comparisons be made with UCR data?
UCR Part I data is collected nationwide in a manner that standardizes the definitions of offenses. However, a number of factors can influence crime counts in particular jurisdictions. These factors should be considered when using UCR crime statistics, especially for comparison purposes.

Variation in the composition of the population, particularly age structure.
Population density and size of locality and its surrounding area.
Stability of population with respect to residents’ mobility and transient factors.
Economic conditions, including job availability.
Cultural conditions, such as education, recreation, and religious characteristics.
Climate.
Effective strength of law enforcement agencies.
Administrative and investigative emphasis of law enforcement.
Policies of other components of the criminal justice system (i.e. prosecutorial, judicial, correctional, and probational).
Attitudes of citizenry toward crime.
Crime reporting practices of citizenry.

What is the value of the UCR program?
Since its inception in 1930, UCR has become a nationwide program. All California law enforcement agencies report UCR data. Quality control surveys conducted by BCS staff since the middle 1970’s have shown a high level of compliance with UCR reporting standards. The number of participants and the amount of data collected under the stringent rules of the system make it a prime indicator of the amount and fluctuation of serious crime.

Interpreting The Graphs

Metropolitan Areas
For each campus, two graphs are provided depicting statistics for violent and property crime, comparing the data with that of the State of California and that of the metropolitan area (county) in which the campus is located. The FBI’s Uniform Crime Report publication, Crime in the United States, also shows the counties that correspond to the metropolitan statistical area for each campus.

The metropolitan area for UC Berkeley is Alameda and Contra Costa Counties.
The metropolitan area for the campus of UC Davis is Solano and Yolo Counties.
For the UC Davis Medical Center, the metropolitan area is Sacramento County.
The metropolitan area for the campus and medical center of UC Irvine is Orange County.
The metropolitan area for UC Merced is Merced County.
The metropolitan area for the campus and medical center of UC Los Angeles is Los Angeles County.
The metropolitan area for UC Riverside corresponds to Riverside and San Bernardino Counties.
The metropolitan area for UC San Diego is San Diego County.
The metropolitan area for UC San Francisco is San Francisco County.
The metropolitan area for UC Santa Barbara is Santa Barbara County.
The metropolitan area for UC Santa Cruz is Santa Cruz County.

Population Figures
It is acknowledged that campuses have a daily population that includes many persons, such as visitors, vendors, contractors and their workers, those attending conferences, patients, and others. Factoring in an estimated number to cover these persons was not considered necessary, since a significant percentage of students do not attend classes each day, a proportionate number of faculty do not teach each day, and a percentage of staff employees are absent for a variety of legitimate reasons.

It is felt such absence offset any figure one might conjure up to cover the additional persons described.

For that reason, the population figures used for the campuses is simply the total number of students, faculty, and staff enrolled or employed at each and is derived from annual University of California Office of the President data sources.

The Jeanne Clery Disclosure Of Campus Security Policy And Campus Crime Statistics Act
The Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act, codified at 20 USC 1092 (f) as a part of the Higher Education Act of 1965, is a federal law that requires colleges and universities to disclose certain timely and annual information about campus crime and security policies. The criteria for defining crime under the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act differs from the criteria under the Uniform Crime Reporting program.

The Annual Report & Crime Statistics, does not include all the information required under “the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act,” rather it does include information from victims who have chosen to report incidents to the criminal justice system. The information contained in this Annual Report & Crime Statistics is included in a separate Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act Annual Report which is published annually on October 1st.

You may visit the University of California, Office of the President Campus Safety and Crime Reporting Requirements of the Clery Act for information regarding crime prevention and reporting at the University of California and links to information for each campus. More information about the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act.