Chicago violent crime trends up as arrests trend down
Chicago residents reported 28,443 violent crimes during 2024. Attacks and threats were both up, with aggravated assaults hitting a 20-year high.
Chicagoans suffered 28,443 violent crimes during 2024, with cases of aggravated assaults rising to the highest levels in two decades, police data shows.
City residents reported 1,614 fewer violent crimes last year than in 2023 as cases of homicide, robbery and criminal sexual assault declined. Violent crimes have been trending upward for the past decade.
Arrests were made in about 1-in-7 violent crimes. The arrest rate has been trending down for 20 years.
While Chicago’s reputation for violence, especially murders, is well earned, but it’s not the nation’s murder capital as some have claimed. In 2024 the city saw homicides drop to nearly the 20-year average.
Aggravated assaults hit a 20-year high in 2024 at 8,039. The more-serious aggravated batteries increased 3.1% last year, the largest percentage increase for a violent crime category, for a total of 9,132. Black residents were 61% of the aggravated battery victims.
According to the Chicago Police Department, aggravated batteries involve all crimes in which the attacker seriously harms the victim through physical contact or the use of a deadly weapon. Aggravated assault can be just the threat of violence.
The city’s arrest rate for aggravated batteries rose to its highest level since before the COVID-19 pandemic, with 1-in-5 resulting in an arrest.
During the past year, aggravated batteries consistently peaked at midnight and reached their lowest levels at 7 a.m. Depending on what time the victim was assaulted, the chances of catching the offender could fall even farther.
The Englewood neighborhood on Chicago’s South Side reported the most aggravated batteries with 594 cases last year. Mayor Brandon Johnson’s home neighborhood of Austin came in a close second.
Overall, 4-in-5 aggravated batteries reported during 2024 occurred on the city’s West and South sides.