By Nat Lownes, DATA Lab Software Engineer, and Kate Kelly, DATA Lab Content Manager 50 years ago, the Philadelphia Inquirer published results from the first-ever computer analysis of criminal legal data to be conducted by a newspaper. This very likely was the first time that Philadelphians had seen...
By the District Attorney’s Transparency Analytics Lab (DATA Lab) Takeaways: The DAO charges nearly every homicide and non-fatal shooting (NFS) arrest. There are many more reported homicides and non-fatal shootings where no arrest is made. The small number of cases that are dismissed by a...
By Mikayla Smith, Research Assistant, DAO DATA Lab Casey Morrison and Lauren Laino, Research Interns, DAO DATA Lab Prosecutors utilize discretion when they decide whether or not to file charges, the type of charges to file, the cases for which they will seek to negotiate pleas, and what concessions...
By Kelly Burkhardt (she/her), Mary Doyle (she/her), and Tyler Tran (he/him) The Philadelphia LGBTQ+ community is struggling to find answers after the assault and death of a Black gay man at a popular gay bar, as queer, transgender, and nonbinary people are at higher risk of being victims of assault,...
By Tyler Tran, Senior Data Analyst, DAO DATA Lab What is a clearance rate? The term “clearance rate” has seen plenty of press this year, with a record number of homicides but few arrests for those homicides. However, the term is not well-defined or understood. Clearance rates are defined as the...
By Tyler Tran, Senior Data Analyst, DAO DATA Lab Low shooting arrest rates: A chronic problem There have been 8,918 shootings in Philadelphia since 2015 that have not led to an arrest. This year alone, there have been 2,296 shootings, and police have made arrests in only 17% of those incidents. Even...
We recently made changes to the Incidents-Arrests-Charges graphics that appear in our monthly Justice Journal newsletter. Previously, the graphics showed the number of incidents from the previous month, as well how many of those incidents led to arrests by police and cases being charged by the...
On December 14, 2021, we changed the way we are categorizing arrests and cases on the Public Data Dashboard. The new method of categorization allows us to more accurately describe how cases move through the system, from incident to arrest to court involvement. Although this change will result in...