Im working on a piece about Memphis and Dr. King for the holiday today as King was assassinated in Memphis. I went there last year on a personal trip, which in retrospect seems kind of scary given the level of crime reported in 2013. But one of the things King stood for was ending poverty. The more the population is integrated, Roman explained, the greater the chances of sizable crime declines. Most crime is committed by people at the bottom of the economic totem pole, he said. Oklahoma is on this list at #10. Tennessee is #1. The number of aggravated assaults in Oklahoma grew by 3.8% in 2012, while they increased just 1.1% nationally. The rate in 2012 came to 337.3 assaults per 100,000 residents, ninth highest among the states. The largest cities, Oklahoma City and Tulsa, have struggled with poverty and gang issues. Like many of the states with high crime rates, postsecondary educational attainment is low in Oklahoma. Only 23.8% have bachelor’s degrees or higher, one of the lowest rates in the country. Oklahoma reported a sharp increase in forcible rape in 2012. FBI data show 1,588 reported rapes, up 12.6% from 2011 and the most since 1994. The incidence of rapes per 100,000 residents reached 41.6 last year, the sixth highest rate in the country. Memphis’s violent crime rate was the nation’s fifth worst, while Nashville’s was the 18th worst. Like many states with high violent crime, poverty in Tennessee is acute, and high school and college graduation rates are lower than most of the country.
Posted on: Mon, 20 Jan 2014 16:33:33 +0000
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