PA ranks 2nd in black homicide victims
Today, the Violence Policy Center (VPC) released its annual list of the states with the highest black homicide victimization rates and Pennsylvania ranks second this year, after dropping down to third last year.
It's a list no state wants to make but it's a list on which Pennsylvania always ranks high.
Today, the Violence Policy Center (VPC) released its annual list of the states with the highest black homicide victimization rates and Pennsylvania ranks second this year, after dropping down to third last year.
The VPC uses the most recent FBI data to compile its statistics, and that's always two years behind, so this year's numbers come from 2010 data.
In 2010, there were 419 black homicide victims in Pennsylvania, making the black homicide rate 26.87 murders per 100,000 black people, according to the VPC.
Pennsylvania ranked only behind Missouri, which had 255 black citizens murdered in 2010 but, due to population, had a homicide victimization rate of 33.86 per 100,000.
The average age of a black homicide victim in Pennsylvania in 2010 was 29 years old and men overwhelmingly outnumbered women by 377 to 42, according to the study.
Guns were behind 84 percent of the killings and 86 percent of the victims were killed by someone they knew, the VPC said.
Nationally, the black homicide victimization rate was 16.32 per 100,000 compared to an overall national homicide rate of 4.43 per 100,000, the VPC said.
This year, New Jersey ranked 14th, Delaware 19th and New York 21st.