Thread. Here are a few helpful disclaimers for journalists to insert into their stories when talking about "crime data" or "crime rates" reported by the police, or when police ask them to report on a "crime wave":
"Property crime data excludes most property crime, including illegal seizures by police (which roughly equal all reported burglary), wage theft by employers (which is about 5x more than all reported property crime), and tax evasion (which is about 20x more than all wage theft)."
"Violent crime data reported by police excludes nearly all of the violent crimes committed by police and jail guards, which experts estimate to include several million physical and sexual assaults each year."
"The vast majority of sexual assault and gender-based violence is not reported to police because most survivors of such violence do not believe that police, prosecutors, and prisons are an effective way to address that harm."
"Experts have concluded that police-reported crime rates are generally lower in societies that spend less money on police, prosecutors, and prisons and that spend more money on health care, education, poverty reduction, and wellness."
And reporters can include this directly after quoting a police officer or prosecutor: "police officials and prosecutors have been shown to regularly make false and misleading statements to the media in order to mislead the public in service of a political agenda."
I flesh out these concepts (and more) in the below thread, with sources:
https://twitter.com/equalityAlec/status/1422949466986921991
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