The Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program defines arson as any willful or malicious burning or attempting to burn, with or without intent to defraud, a dwelling house, public building, motor vehicle or aircraft, personal property of another, etc.
Only the fires that investigation determined to have been willfully set-not fires labeled as suspicious or of unknown origin are included in this arson data collection.
Points to consider regarding arson statistics include:
The number of arsons reported by individual law enforcement agencies is available in Tables 8-11, arson trend data (indicating a year-to-year change) are in Tables 12-15, and arson clearance data (crimes solved) can be found in Arson Table 2 and Tables 25-28.
Expanded offense data are the details of the various offenses that the Program collects beyond the count of how many crimes law enforcement agencies report. These details may include the type of weapons used in a crime, type or value of items stolen, and so forth. In addition, expanded data include trends (for example, 2-year comparisons) and rates per 100,000 inhabitants.
Expanded information regarding arson is available in the following tables:
Trends (2-year): Tables 12, 13, 14, 15
Property types: Table 15
Arson Table 1, "Arson Rate, by Population Group, 2005"
Arson Table 2, "Arson, by Type of Property, 2005"
Contact the Communications Unit of the FBI's Criminal Justice Information Services Division via e-mail at cjis_comm@leo.gov or by telephone at (304) 625-4995.