Editor’s note: Annual FBI reports contain the most expansive collection of crime data available nationally. While the FBI website insists its data is “reliable,” an MLive review revealed the FBI statistics regularly differ —sometimes substantially — from year-end numbers reported by police agencies. For this reason, readers should use discretion when drawing conclusions from crime rates or rankings produced from FBI data.
Six Michigan cities, including Saginaw, Detroit, Kalamazoo, Battle Creek, Inkster and Lansing, ranked among the nation’s 50 most violent cities, according to FBI statistics released last week.
But identified discrepancies in reporting mean the data should be viewed with caution…