Mike: But I am also curious as how the stats are collected to determine the 37th place.
SF: 37th comes from sorting this list on total violent crime:
My question was more about how the stats are collected that go into that list.
IOW, are consistent rules followed across cities or can a DA, for example, choose to not press charges and thus no crime was committed and counted.
Looking at the footnotes to that list it is instructive to read this:
The FBI web site recommends against using its data for ranking because these rankings lead to simplistic and/or incomplete analyses that often create misleading perceptions adversely affecting cities and counties, along with their residents.[4] The FBI web site also recommends against using its data to judge how effective law enforcement agencies are, since there are many factors that influence crime rates other than law enforcement
Mike