Bismarck Leading the Nation in Violent Crime Growth

[UPDATE 2/12]: The Bismarck Police Department has issued a press release, stating that they will be asking the original authors of the article, 247WallStreet.com, to issue a retraction to the story, due to the fact that violent crime only rose 14.3% from 2009 to 2013 in Bismarck.

The press release states that the Bismarck Police Dept. reports its annual crime statistics to the North Dakota Attorney General's Office, who in turn reports them to the FBI. The numbers reported by the Bismarck Police Dept. were nowhere near what was reported by 247WallStreet.com, according to the press release.

[ORIGINAL STORY]: Due to the population boom Bismarck, and really the entire state of North Dakota, has experienced over the past five years, the violent crime rate in our area has skyrocketed.

In a new report from Huffington Post, Bismarck ranks as the top city where violent crime is soaring in the United States, due to the fact that the violent crime rate has risen over 92% in the last five years.

In 2009, Bismarck saw 206.6 violent crimes per 100,000 people. In 2013, that number jumped to 397.6. Bismarck also saw 3.0 murders per 100,000 people in 2013.

Here's what Huffington Post had to say about the increasing crime in the capital city:

While economic prosperity often helps to lower crime rates, this was not the case in Bismarck. Although wages in Bismarck have grown significantly since North Dakota’s oil boom began, the massive influx of residents may have also strained local police. The area’s unemployment rate of just 2.6% in 2013 was one of the lowest nationwide. And a typical household earned nearly $65,000 that year, one of the highest figures. Yet, crime has been on the rise. Drunk driving, which is not even part of the violent and property crime rates reviewed, rose 81% across the state between 2009 and 2013, and Bismarck has reported a similarly high incidence of drunk driving. In addition, while the murder rate declined between 2009 and 2013 in Bismarck, the aggravated assault rate more than doubled during those years, from 158.0 per 100,000 people in 2009 to 319.5 per 100,000 residents in 2013.

Here's the Huffington Post's entire list of nine cities where violent crime is soaring: