Despite some online statistics, Calcasieu Parish District Attorney John DeRosier said Lake Charles is “one of the safest communities in the country.”

DeRosier, Calcasieu Sheriff Tony Mancuso and Lake Charles Police Chief Don Dixon addressed crime in the city and parishwide to members of the Republican Roundtable during a meeting Monday.

The Lake Charles Wikipedia page mentions that the city’s violent crime rate is “one of the highest in the nation, across communities of all sizes.” That information came from www.neighborhoodscout.com and www.areavibes.com, which DeRosier said are both real estate-based websites. 

Another issue, DeRosier said, is the difference in results from the Uniform Crime Reports system and the National Incident-Based Reporting System. Calcasieu Parish currently uses the UCR. Under the NIBRS, he said, the crime rate in Lake Charles would be “probably half of the national average.”

“That is the accurate number,” he said. “When you take our UCR reporting and compare it to a city of the same size on the NIBRS system, our crime rate is going to be two to three times higher than theirs, although we have fewer incidents of actual crime.”

DeRosier said more than half of the cities and states nationwide have switched to the NIBRS. He said Calcasieu is in the process of converting to the system.Crime Reports discussed at Republican Roundtable

Mancuso said his department “never uses the UCR” when drafting its crime report.

“It’s so inaccurate,” he said. “The numbers are not what they appear to be.”

Over the last 10 years, Mancuso said crime has either gone up or down by 2 percent to 5 percent.

“Crime has really not done anything,” he said. “It has basically stayed the same. Don’t look at a website that just throws a number up there.”

Mancuso said he cannot recall the last time a murder or violent crime occurred where the victim and suspect didn’t know each other or where drugs weren’t involved. 

“It wasn’t a real whodunit,” he said. “That very rarely happens.”

Mancuso said there were 423 sexual assaults in the parish last year. Only 23 were incidents where the victim didn’t know who the suspect was.

“We’re not perfect; we do have crime here,” he said. “(But) we do live in a very safe community.”

Dixon said his department focuses on solving the crimes that have occurred. He said they solved each of the 10 homicides that occurred last year, with help from residents who provided officers with information to make arrests.

He said the department solved 92.7 percent of the nearly 1,900 crimes against a person committed last year. The national average, he said, is 46 percent.

“That’s what I care about,” Dixon said.

Mancuso said his department has not seen a spike in crime related to the economic growth with the industrial expansion projects. 

Dixon said the UCR compares crimes per 100,000 people. He said the system uses a population of 75,000 for Lake Charles, something that is inaccurate because of RV parks, McNeese State University and other factors.

“Our population is probably about 120,000, so that’s skewed in itself,” Dixon said. “There’s no doubt we’re a much busier town.”

Another inaccuracy, DeRosier said, is how many people are incarcerated in Calcasieu Parish. Officials with the Southern Poverty Law Center told the American Press in May that Calcasieu has the highest incarceration rate per capita. According to the state Department of Corrections, Calcasieu is the seventh largest in the state, with roughly 3 percent incarcerated per 100,000 people.

DeRosier said most people who are incarcerated for non-violent crimes also committed violent crimes, but were imprisoned for the non-violent offenses. 

Mancuso said the non-violent arrests are “sometimes the only thing” law enforcement can prove.

“We have to play by the rules,” Mancuso said. “We don’t put somebody in jail unless they really need to be in jail.”