October 23, 2023 (ANCHORAGE, AK) – The Alaska Department of Public Safety (DPS) has released the
2022 Crime in Alaska Report and
Alaska Felony Sex Offense Report. Both reports provide detailed property and violent crime statistics and analysis specific to Alaska. In 2022, the overall number of crimes reported decreased by 1.6%. Additionally, the number of rapes reported to Alaska law enforcement decreased by 5.9%. The number of reported property crimes also decreased by 2.9%, continuing the decreasing trend that began in 2018.
“Public safety has been my administration’s top priority since day one. We’ve made progress by giving Alaska law enforcement and prosecutors the tools they need to protect victims and bring those responsible to justice,”
said Governor Mike Dunleavy. “Alaska’s overall crime rate is down, property crime is down, and the rate of sexual assault is down significantly with Western Alaska seeing a decrease of close to 9 percent in felony sex crimes. The backlog of untested sexual assault examination kits is cleared and in the system. While there is still work to do, I will not take my foot off the pedal and will continue to increase the resources toward public safety, corrections, and prosecutors.”
The Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program is a nationwide effort by federal, state, city, county, and tribal law enforcement agencies to report data on crimes reported in their jurisdiction. The report is a resource for measuring the trend and distribution of crime in Alaska. Under Alaska law, law enforcement agencies in Alaska are required to submit UCR data to DPS. In 2022, 30 agencies reported crime data to DPS. These agencies represent 99.3% of the state's population. 2022 is also the second year that a significant number of agencies have participated in the federal National Incident Based Reporting System, or NIBRS, reporting model. This new reporting model captures additional details about the suspects and victims of crime to allow for additional data set tracking.
"While the 2022 crime data continues to show decreasing crime rates in many categories, we also have significant work to do addressing violent crimes such as murder and aggravated assault,"
stated Alaska Department of Public Safety Commissioner James Cockrell. "Your Alaska State Troopers will continue to work with our local, state, and federal law enforcement partners to address crime across the state, so that every Alaskan feels safe in their community. "
The 2022 Crime in Alaska report was authored by the Alaska Department of Public Safety's Division of Statewide Services. The Division of Statewide Services provides technical and specialized services to the Department of Public Safety and law enforcement agencies across the state. Past Crime in Alaska Reports and Felony-Level Sex Offenses reports can be found
online here.
The UCR and Crime in Alaska reports are based on the Federal Bureau of Investigation UCR Program definitions of crimes to ensure consistency and uniformity in reported offenses nationally. The definitions do not always echo state definitions; therefore, federal publications cannot accurately be compared to reports that use the state definitions for crimes as these are unique to each state. Additionally, the population counts for Crime in Alaska come from the US Census.