No city is alien to criminal activities taking place on its ground, and in this article, Insider Monkey provides you a list of 16 cities with the highest crime rates in the world.
When I finished my BA studies, I wanted to spend a year traveling. It would be a year of self-discovery where I would truly get to know myself by interacting with other people who live across the globe. Intersubjectivity, as philosophers call it. When I revealed my plan to the members of my family, they were quick to suggest that I am exposing myself to grave dangers. For them, the lands of far away were representing an imminent threat – threat of me being kidnapped, raped, murdered, and in the best case scenario robbed. Of course, this is not true and my family exaggerated, however, it is accurate to say that the probability of these things happening to me or anyone else is greater in some cities than in others. For example, the probability is higher if you live in one of the 35 worst most dangerous ghettoest cities in America in 2017 ranked by FBI. The statistics do not go to your advantage if you happen to be in one of the 11 countries with the highest crime rate per capita in the world. These are simply facts. In this article, we point to the world’s worst crime cities. If you happen to be traveling to one of those places anytime soon, try to enjoy them as much as you can, but also be careful and take good care of yourself.
Most of the cities with the highest murder rates are located in Latin America. Since cocaine is grown mostly in the countries of South America, where it is also smuggled to reach the market of USA, it is no wonder that these are fertile grounds for criminal activities. As The Economist suggests, the deadliest city in the world in 2015 and 2016 was the capital of El Salvador, San Salvador. In 2016, San Salvador noted 137 killings per 100.000 people. The Intelligence Unit of the Economist published a report on the safe cities in 2017. Tokyo, Singapore, Osaka, Toronto, Melbourne, Amsterdam, Sydney, Stockholm, Hong Kong, and Zurich are the top 10 safest cities in the world in 2017. It would be amazing to live in a place which is a merging of safety and wealth. Not that long ago, Insider Monkey published an article on 20 richest cities in the world by 2016 GDP per capita. Some of the richest cities in the world are Macau, Hartford, San Jose, Houston, and Boston. These cities also do not have high crime rates.
Much like is the case in any other country in the world, the authorities in the USA are in a never-ending battle against crime. The rate of criminal activities differs from one place to another. The highest crime rates in the US are recorded in New Mexico. The authorities of Albuquerque, the most populated city in New Mexico, cannot efficiently solve the problem of drug-related crime, which is the root of violence in this state. Other US cities with the high rates of crime are Memphis (TN), Seattle (WA), Tucson (AZ), and Baltimore (MD), and these are among the top worst cities in America. If we look at the homicide rates by city in the USA, the picture is somewhat different. As the Bismarck Tribune notes, St. Louis (MO), Baltimore (MD) and Detroit (MI) are the cities with the highest number of murders in 2015. St. Louis notes the staggering murder rate of 59.29 murders per 100.000 people. This is some alarming data as it points to an increase in murder rates when compared to the data from 2014, which was 49.9 murders per 100.000 people. I do not know what is happening in St. Louis, but being the first in the “most murders by city USA” rankings for two consecutive years is an apparent call for some kind of an intervention.
When drafting the list of 16 cities with the highest crime rates in the world, I have taken into account a number of factors. Since homicide is the gravest crime one can commit, I included the data on homicide rates by the Igarapé Institute. I also used the data regarding rape rates worldwide and which are contained in the report published by the European Institute for Crime Prevention and Control. The report offers an insight into international statistics with regards to crime and justice. Furthermore, I used the data provided by the World Bank on crime and theft index. To create the list, I also referred to the data on crime index worldwide, provided by Numbeo, which is based on surveys from website visitors. These sources provided a plenty of material for me to rank cities according to the highest crime rates in the world.
