THUNDER BAY — Violent crime became a bigger problem in Thunder Bay last year than in 2019.
New data from Statistics Canada shows the city's violent crime severity index rose by nearly four per cent.
The index measures the severity of police-reported violent crime such as homicide, assaults and robberies.
It was almost 153 in the Thunder Bay area last year, compared with indices of 147 the year before, 163 in 2018, 142 in 2017 and 124 in 2016.
Among Canada's 35 largest population centres, only Winnipeg had a higher severe crime index than Thunder Bay, at 154.
Regina and Saskatoon had the third and fourth highest indices, at 127 and 120 respectively.
The index in Sudbury was 112.
From 2005 to 2020, Thunder Bay, Winnipeg and Regina have consistently reported among the highest violent crime severity values in the country, with Thunder Bay and Winnipeg reporting among the three highest values every year for the past decade.
In 2020, Thunder Bay reported the fourth highest violent crime rate (1,659 incidents per 100,000 population), behind Lethbridge, Moncton, and Kelowna.
Statistics Canada also confirmed that – for the fifth year in a row – Thunder Bay had the highest homicide rate in the country, 6.35 per 100,000 population..
There were eight homicides in the area in 2020.
Winnipeg had the second-highest homicide rate at 4.93 per 100,000.
The number of police-reported hate crimes in Thunder Bay also increased last year, going from four incidents in 2019 to 14 incidents last year.
That gave Thunder Bay the fifth-highest hate-crime rate among major population centres, behind Guelph, Ottawa, Peterborough and Vancouver.
However, the city's overall crime rate – including both violent and non-violent crimes – actually fell by 16 per cent, compared with a drop in the national crime rate of only 10 per cent.
There was a substantial decline in the incidence of break-ins and thefts in Thunder Bay.
The city's overall crime severity index was eighth highest among the country's 35 largest cities.
Statistics Canada says stay-at-home orders and other restrictions meant more people were at home for longer periods of time last year, while fewer people were out publicly, reducing opportunities for many types of crime:
The first year of the COVID-19 pandemic had an unprecedented impact on the economic and social lives of Canadians. As a result of efforts to contain the spread of the virus, the way people lived, worked and socialized changed drastically, with many people staying at home for long periods of times and avoiding public gatherings and businesses adjusting their operations to serve Canadians in new or different ways. At least partially as a result of these changes, police-reported crime in Canada dropped throughout the pandemic period in general, yet there were important differences for some types of crime.
In 2020, all measures of the police-reported Crime Severity Index (CSI) – the overall CSI, the Violent CSI and the Non-violent CSI – decreased, following five consecutive annual increases. The decline in the overall CSI in 2020 was the result of decreases in police-reported rates of numerous offences. Notably, there were decreases in the rates of police-reported breaking and entering (-16 per cent), theft of $5,000 or under (-20 per cent), robbery (-18 per cent), shoplifting of $5,000 or under (-36 per cent), administration of justice violations (-17 per cent) and sexual assault (level 1) (-9 per cent). In contrast, rates of some offences increased in 2020, including child pornography (+23 per cent), offences related to opioids (+34 per cent), identity theft (+52 per cent) and identity fraud (+12 per cent), and harassing and threatening behaviours.
Source: Statistics Canada
