You Ask: Berkeley Police Explain Crime Stats

[Have a question about crime in Berkeley? Let us know in the comments or by email, at Berkeley@Patch.com, and we'll see what we can find out.]

Berkeley Patch Monday showing city crime data for the first few weeks of August. Readers commented on the numbers, wanting more information on the crime stats.

Patch asked Berkeley Police Department Public Information Officer Jennifer Coats to give readers a breakdown of how the department constructs the crime data. Here's what Coats had to say:

The numbers provided are Calls For Service (CFS), (and) those numbers change...They are just a snapshot of what occurs in the City of Berkeley... 

We actually have a higher number of arrests than what is shown on the report.  What is reported in the CFS numbers are part one crimes only, such as homicide, rape, robbery, burglary, theft, auto theft and arson and in those cases only certain statutes qualify under the part one crimes for Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR).   

We handle many different types of CFSs that are not reported under part one crimes.  Please understand that those numbers may change after a review process.  The cases could be reclassified by the handling officer, investigating detective, supervisor or the District Attorney, based on the facts of each case. 

In some cases the number of the different type of cases as well as arrests could go down or up if the case needs to be reclassified to the proper statute.  For a little perspective, since Aug. 1 BPD has made approximately 165 arrests.