SpotCrime - The Public's Crime Map

Clowns are taking up a lot of police resources this past month and it is not funny. What seemed like legitimate concerns of reports of clowns trying to lure children into the woods in Greenville County, SC has turned into a slew of false police reports of clown sightings and vague threats by people posing as clowns along the southeast and up the east coast. These reports not being taken lightly. Since police departments are unable to discern whether a report is true or false, police still have to take all threats seriously and respond and investigate accordingly. False reports and vague or fake threats that are ‘jokes’ take valuable time and resources away from police and residents which translates into money away from taxpayers. Mashable created a map of the original clown sightings that occurred in Greenville County and we’ve updated a map of our own. We tried to map all incidents, but some came without an address (typically ones where a juvenile was involved). V...

The  murder rate is on the rise , gun deaths in America are at an all time high , and cities like Chicago and Baltimore  are facing huge criticisms on policing tactics. Is the shooting epidemic across America's cities a  policing issue , policy issue, or cultural issue? This question is up for debate. What we do know is that it is imperative that the public know about and have access to this kind of crime data and information.  There is no federal repository for nationwide shooting data , so what does shooting data look like on a map? Check out SpotCrime. We’re the only major crime map to break out shooting as it’s own icon. Shootings in Chicago Chicago shootings Aug 12 - Sept 12, 2016 Rightfully so, Chicago is constantly under fire (no pun intended) for the large amount of shootings the city experiences daily . Chicago saw 65 shootings Labor Day weekend alone . The chief recently attributed it to a cultural issue rather than a policing is...

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A lot of people are wondering who is the lesser of two evils - Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton? They both seem to fall into the same bucket when it comes to transparency . Their views on crime and safety differ. Read about Trump’s stance on crime and safety here . Read about Hillary’s stance on crime and safety here . Political opinions aside, we decided to look at the crime around events candidates have held since they received their party's nomination. We couldn't draw too many conclusions. Not every police agency reports data, and those that do do not follow any specific reporting standards. However, we did notice: Trump has held more rallies (30) than Clinton (13). Trump tends to visit cities/areas with a smaller population density than Clinton. This gives him a higher chance of being in a city that is not open with crime data (smaller cities do not have the resources of the larger cities). Obviously the Secret Service would not allow a rally to t...