NASHVILLE – On Monday, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation released its 2018 ‘Crime in Tennessee’ report, which details the volume and nature of criminal across the state.

The report utilizes data submitted to the Tennessee Incident Based Reporting System (TIBRS). Among the findings in this year’s report:

·         Overall, the number of reported instances of the most serious crimes decreased 3.6% from 2017.

·         Reported cases of murder decreased 8.0% from 2017 to 2018.

·         The number of reported rapes decreased 4.7% in the same time period.

·         Juvenile arrestees made up 8.1% of those arrested for the most serious offenses. Simple Assault made up the most arrests among juveniles, at 25.7%, followed by Drug/Narcotic Violations, at 17.6% in 2018.

·         Reported instances of offenses flagged as domestic violence decreased 6.0% from 2017 to 2018.

·         The number of reported methamphetamine-related offenses continued to increase, from 13,483 in 2017 to 15,899 in 2018.

“The TIBRS program continues to serve as a model for the national and remains successful because of the continued cooperation by Tennessee’s law enforcement community,” said TBI Director David Rausch. “We hope this year’s report continues to shape the conversation about how best to make Tennessee and even better – and even safer – place to live.”

The TBI strongly discourages using the data collected in the TIBRS program to rank or compare one agency to another, as doing so does not take into consideration the context of demographics and socio-economic factors. It is more appropriate, in TBI’s assessment, to compare an agency’s crime data over time.

The full 2018 report is available for review on TBI’s website: www.tn.gov/tbi.