Crime rates (2010) (Population of 464,628) Crime type Rate Homicide 7.3 Forcible rape 41.8 Robbery 155.6 Aggravated assault 282.4 Violent crime 487.1 Burglary 655.6 Larceny-theft 2,602.3 Motor vehicle theft 472.9 Property crime 3,730.7Crime rates per 100,000 persons Source: FBI 2010 UCR data Compare with other cities?
Crime in Omaha, Nebraska has varied widely, ranging from Omaha's early years as a frontier town with typically widespread gambling and prostitution, to civic expectation of higher standards as the city grew, and contemporary concerns about violent crimes related to gangs and dysfunctions of persistent unemployment, poverty and lack of education among some residents.
As a major industrial city into the mid-20th century, Omaha shared in social tensions of larger cities that accompanied rapid growth and many new immigrants and migrants. By mid-century Omaha was a center for illicit betting, while experiencing dramatic job losses and unemployment because of dramatic restructuring of the railroads and the meatpacking industry, as well as other sectors. Persistent poverty resulting from discrimination and job loss generated different crimes in the late 20th century, with drug trade and drug abuse becoming associated with violent crime rates, which climbed after 1986 as Los Angeles gangs made affiliates in the city.Hull, J. (1993) "A Boy and his Gun", Time magazine. Retrieved 8/17/07. With the nationally famous kidnapping of Edward Cudahy, Jr. in 1900 and the subsequent acquittal of the accused kidnapper, Pat Crowe, The Washington Post wrote, "Omaha is evidently a happy hunting ground for savages and malefactors.""1906 Kidnapping" , NebraskaStudies.org. State of Nebraska. Retrieved 10/20/10.
Since the 1990s crime has been reduced for the city overall. According to crime statistics released by the FBI, Omaha's rate of violent crimes per 100,000 residents has been lower than the average rates of three dozen cities of similar size. Omaha's rate of violent crime was 601.1 in 2005, compared to 995.6 for cities with populations from 250,000 to 500,000. Unlike Omaha, violent crime overall for those cities has trended upward since 2003. Rates for property crime have decreased for both Omaha and its peer cities during the same time period.Crime in Omaha , Greater Omaha Economic Development Council. Retrieved 5/13/08. In 2006 Omaha was ranked for homicides as 46th out of the 72 cities in the United States of more than 250,000 in population, making it quite a safe city for most inhabitants. FBI 2006 Universal Crime Rate (UCR)
History
19th century Omaha had an early history as a "wide-open town" where prostitution, gambling, drugs and alcohol were accepted.Leighton, G.R. (1939) Five Cities: The Story of Their Youth and Old Age. Ayer Publishing. p. 194 There were no official law-enforcement officers until after the city was incorporated. On February 12, 1857, the city of Omaha was incorporated and in March J.A. Miller was appointed the city marshall. In March 1866, the city council enlarged the police force to four men. Prostitution was a brisk trade in early Omaha, and sex workers in the Burnt District numbered 1,500 by the 1870s.
In 1868, the city council created the position of "police judge" and appointed John H. Sahler. Later that year, the city council directed members of the force to provide themselves with "dark blue, single breasted coats, shirts and pants of the same material". They were required to have caps with a brass plate in the front marked City Police. Between 1869 and 1882 the size of the department fluctuated, reaching 14 officers in 1882. In 1884, Marshal Roger T. Guthrie was convicted and imprisoned for accepting a bribe.
Early years of land grabs by the Omaha Claim Club were thwarted by the 1857 trial of Baker v. Morton, where the United States Supreme Court ruled that Omaha's land barons could not claim up large amounts of land in order to sell them at exorbitant costs. This stopped homesteading in the area. While the common practice ended, early land grabs were fruitful. Lots in one of the early plots were subdivided to form Scriptown, where territorial legislators were awarded with land for keeping the controversial capital in Omaha.Roenfeld, R. (nd) Sam Bayliss on Broadway . The Historical Society of Pottawattamie County, Iowa. Retrieved 6/7/07.
Because of the lack of police force, in early years groups sometimes resorted to lynchings, as elements of the community enforced their own rough justice. Victims were likely to be outsiders, transient workers or laborers who did not live in the city, whom no one knew. In the west and south, victims were lynched for alleged crimes of property as well as of violence. In 1891 there was the first recorded lynching in Omaha of an African American. A mob lynched Joe Coe, also known as George Smith, a worker from Council Bluffs across the river. He had allegedly raped a white woman. No one was tried for Coe's murder.Bristow, D. (2002) A Dirty, Wicked Town: Tale of 19th Century Omaha. Caxton Press. p. 74.
At the start of the 20th century, Anna Wilson ran a high-class brothel in the Sporting District, the vice district run by political boss Tom Dennison. During the Trans-Mississippi Exposition of 1898, Ada Everleigh and her sister ran a high-class bordello to make a profit from the many visitors to the city. They closed their operation soon after the expo and moved to the larger environs of Chicago.
Notable 19th-century crimes in Omaha There were several notable crimes in Omaha during its first 50 years. They included the murder of a federal clerk on November 4, 1881. After receiving several anonymous letters and postcards threatening his life because of his enforcement of the Slocumb Laws and state laws prohibiting Sunday liquor sales, Colonel W.B. Smith, Clerk of the United States Circuit and District Courts, was murdered in Omaha."Criminals and their deeds; The Omaha murder", The New York Times. November 7, 1881. Retrieved 5/26/08."The recent murder in Omaha", The New York Times. December 16, 1881. Retrieved 5/26/08. On November 15, 1891, Nettie Birdler, a private in the Salvation Army, murdered Captain Haddie Smith during an international exposition of the army's troops, with representatives from across the United States and France present. The motive of the murder went unknown, as Birdler committed suicide immediately after shooting Smith."A Salvation Army tragedy", The New York Times. November 16, 1891. Retrieved 5/26/08.
Joe Coe, also known as George Smith, was a 50-year-old African-American railroad porter who was lynched by a mob on October 8, 1891. He was accused of raping a 14-year-old. Coe had an alibi and witnesses attesting to his innocence. Because he had been convicted of rape several years before in neighboring Council Bluffs, the mob decided he was guilty of this event. A crowd of 10,000 gathered for the lynching.Bristow, D.L. (2002) A Dirty, Wicked Town. Caxton Press. p 253. Seven men were arrested for the crime, including the chief of police and a major businessman; however, after a mob gathered outside of the jail and threatened to destroy it in order to "liberate" the suspects, each of them were freed, and nobody was ever brought to trial for the lynching."Lynchers under arrest", The New York Times. October 11, 1891. Retrieved 5/25/08.
On June 11, 1895, James Ish murdered a man named Chappele after finding him in an embrace and kissing his wife. After he initially corroborated his wife's story confessing she killed Chappele when he attempted to abduct her, Ish later recanted and admitted his own guilt, confident a jury would not find him guilty."Ish admits he shot Chappele", The New York Times. June 11, 1895. Retrieved 5/26/08. In another affair of the heart, on November 18, 1888, Eliza Beechler, the wife of Harry W. King, Jr., a merchant from Chicago, followed him to Omaha's Paxton Hotel where she suspected him of carrying on an affair. On her arrival he insisted she leave, and after escorting her to the hotel lobby she shot him several times, murdering him. It was later revealed that King had married three different women, including the one with whom he shared the room at the Paxton. The crime caused a sensation in Omaha, Chicago, where the King family was prominent at the time, and St. Louis, close to where the third wife was from."A deserted wife's crime", The New York Times. November 18, 1888. Retrieved 5/25/08.
On November 5, 1895, three men were held in suspicion of their involvement in the abduction and murder of an eleven-year-old girl."Brutal murder of an Omaha girl", The New York Times. November 5, 1895. Retrieved 5/25/08. On April 14, 1899, Anton Inda, an Omaha policeman, was held for murder after an African American singer named J.A. Smith was murdered at the police station. Smith was killed when he was stabbed in the skull with a stilleto, and a witness was suspected to have been suppressed through intimidation."Policeman held for murder", The New York Times. April 14, 1899. Retrieved 5/25/08.
In 1900 the city and country closely followed the kidnapping of 16-year-old Edward Cudahy Jr. After the boy's father, a meatpacking magnate, paid ransom, Edward Cudahy, Jr. was safely returned. Police and officials in Omaha and other cities were concerned that the payment of ransom would set an unfortunate precedent for other cases. Although the kidnappers were caught several years later, both were acquitted, in part because Nebraska did not have a statute relating directly to kidnapping. One of the kidnappers, Pat Crowe, became somewhat of a folk hero for this crime and robberies, even appearing as a speaker about them.. Nebraska State Historical Society. Retrieved 9/25/07.
Tom Dennison's political machine
Early in the 1890s Tom Dennison, a gambler and saloon-owner from Colorado and Montana, arrived in Omaha and established a base of political power. He took control of most of the vice elements in the city. For more than 25 years, Dennison's power was so great that he controlled crime in the city, the police reported to him daily, and a mayor answered directly to him.(nd) "Dennison's Political Machine" . NebraskaStudies.org. Retrieved 6/21/07. The Dennison political machine ended in 1935 after he died. During his reign, Dennison kept an office at the Budweiser Saloon in the Sporting District, where he looked after his interests.
20th-century changes
On September 28, 1919, the Omaha Race Riot erupted, one of many race riots that occurred in cities that year, reflecting common postwar economic stress and social tensions. In Omaha, Tom Dennison fanned tensions through sensational news accounts to build his own political power. The immediate cause of the riot was the arrest of 41-year-old Will Brown, an African-American Omaha civilian, on charges that he had raped a young white woman. The newspaper had contended a rash of attacks had occurred.
A mob of white men, led by volatile adolescents, gathered at the Douglas County Courthouse, their numbers growing by the hour. They threatened grabbing Brown as vigilantes. They lynched Omaha Mayor Edward Smith as he tried to prevent the mob from taking Brown. The mayor was rescued by Omaha police, but they could not control the mob. The men set fire to the Courthouse while trying to flush out Brown and police officers trying to protect him and numerous other prisoners. They lynched Brown after he was turned over to them and then attacked other parts of the city. Utterly unable to control the situation, the city asked for help from the United States Army. By September 29, the Army had declared martial law, enforcing it with 1,700 soldiers from nearby Fort Omaha, Camp Funston (part of present-day Fort Riley, Kansas) and Camp Dodge, Iowa.The Race Riots of 1919-1920 No further loss of life occurred after Brown was lynched.