Morgan County Crime? (Chattanooga, Oak Ridge, Wartburg: crime rate, stats, safe)

[GSD101]

I was just looking at the stats for Morgan County since we are looking at property there, and the crime difference from 2004 to 2005 is amazing.
In 2004 there were 0 murders. In 2005 there were 14 murders in a county with only about 20,000 people residing, burglaries and theft also went up by 100% or greater. Does anyone have any comments or know why there has been such a jump in crime in this area?

[TreeFarm]

I just checked Wartburg's stats (the county seat), and they had no murders. However, I did notice that stats are shown a couple of ways. One is actual numbers, and the other is rate per 100,000. Is it possible that you were actually looking at something like that? In a small population segment, just one "event" can extrapolate to an unrealistically large number when it is expressed as a rate per X, where X is much larger than the total population of the area in question.

For example, Wartburg had only 3 thefts for 2005, yet that is reported as 324 thefts per 100,000, which seems like a huge number. However, most years Watburg reports 0 or 1 theft. Seems like a pretty safe place to me.

I hoper that makes sense.

[firepower]

I don't believe for a minute that's an accurate figure as a straight up number.

I was looking at Catoosa County,GA(Ringgold,Ft.Oglethorpe) the other day & it reported 76 murders in 2005! That's 3 times more than the neighboring city of Chattanooga which is more than double the size!

Obviously not all these are accurate...



firepower

[GSD101]

The numbers may not be accurate, but I did get the numbers from City-Data concerning Morgan County.

[Pimpy]

Unless city-data is now reporting incidences of cow tipping, noise ordinance violations by way of country music and pickup truck engines, and underage tobacky spittin', Morgan County's crime index should be nowhere near what you're implying it is.

I grew up in nearby Oak Ridge and I can safely say that Morgan County would be the last place I would go if I was itchin' to get killed.

[GSD101]

I'm not implying anything. That is why I am asking, because I thought it was a bit strange for such a small community to have so much crime. Especially, from one year to the next. I didn't put the numbers there, I just read them.

[hiknapster]

Well, based on my dealings with the residents of Morgan County today, coupled with this news report, the crime rate may go up tonight!

Train hauling alcoholic beverages derails in Morgan Co.

[firepower]

Originally Posted by hiknapster

Well, based on my dealings with the residents of Morgan County today, coupled with this news report, the crime rate may go up tonight!

Train hauling alcoholic beverages derails in Morgan Co.

Yeah I saw that on TV!
They'd better guard those cars tonight!...

I'd say the only way Morgan County could have 14 murders in a year is if someone set a bomb off at a **** fight or something!



firepower

[Administrator]

Sorry for the confusion. The 2005 county crime stats were added just a couple days ago and there was an error for some counties. The data has now been corrected. The number of reported murders indeed did increase, but only to 2.

[GSD101]

Thanks for clearing that up. I thought is was rather high for such a quiet place.