Washington state has more than 6,800,000 people. Though we’re not a high-crime state, bad things do happen – but our law enforcers are getting better at tracking crime and responding to it.
A big part of the effort is information. There are local police departments in our cities, sheriff deputies in every county and state troopers keeping the highways safe. All of those different departments have their own computer systems and ways of doing things.
Yet they cooperate closely when it comes to sharing information about crime, and work together to catch criminals who don’t confine their activities neatly to city limits or county lines.
Every year, the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs (WASPC) works to coordinate all those numbers and produce a comprehensive Crime in Washington report.
The 2012 report is out, and while they’re still working the numbers and will release an updated version, this first draft contains interesting and valuable information.
Here are two good snapshots from the report, to give you a good look at (1) how often crimes happen in Washington state and (2) a breakdown of major crimes.
