VIOLENT CRIME RATE
Violent crime, as defined by the FBI, is “composed of four offenses: murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, and aggravated assault” (4). If a woman is raped by an HIV positive man, the chances that they contracted AIDS or another STD are extremely high, as it is doubtful that a rapist uses a condom. Also, many times drug use is associated with committing crimes and lack of condom use, as inhibitions are released and judgment is clouded. This is why violent crime rate seemed like a logical place for a strong, meaningful correlation with AIDS rates. The criterion for violent crimes defined by the FBI was the same used to determine the violent crime rate per 1,000 people in various cities in New Jersey by ePodunk, a profiling site for cities (2). There is a statistically significant correlation coefficient of 0.73, between the violent crime rates of these fifteen cities and their AIDS rate (see Appendix 2). Though I was unable to find the violent crime rate for Orange, the rest had a strong correlation. Irvington had the highest violent crime rate of 24.6 followed by East Orange (19.9) and Passaic (11.2). Irvington and Passaic both have high AIDS rates of 2,059 and 764 per 100,000 people respectively. In addition, Irvington is a predominantly African American community, which fits the previous correlation showing that high percentages of African Americans in a community are strongly associated with high AIDS rates.
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