Maine saw more people killed in homicides in 2022 than 2021, but the overall number of crimes committed decreased slightly.
There were 44,380 reported crimes across Maine, including crimes against people, property and society, according to the Incident Based Reporting data released Wednesday by the state of Maine. There were 44,599 such crimes in 2021.
Maine requires police departments to report their data, and 127 of 129 agencies did so, per the report. Baileyville and Monmouth “did not meet the criteria of submitting all 12 months” of data, it said.
There were just more than 1,385,000 people living in Maine in 2022.
Overall there were about 300 fewer crimes against people in 2022 than in 2021, which includes sexual assault, kidnapping, homicide and intimadation, with 13,155 victims, compared with 13,240 in 2021, according to the report.
The latest data seem to indicate that crime in Maine is continuing to decrease. The way the information is collected changed in 2021, which means comparing 2022 data with prior years is difficult, according to the report. But reported crimes in Maine decreased more than 50 percent from 2011 to 2020, according to previous reporting. Crimes such as rape, robbery and assault were among those to decrease.
Maine had 28 homicides and nonnegligent manslaughters, 15 of which were domestic, where a family member or partner was killed. That means it was a willful killing of a person by another person. There were 20 people killed in this way in 2021.
Fifteen people were killed with guns, while six were killed by “dangerous weapons.”
Nineteen people were killed in negligent manslaughter, which is when someone is killed by gross negligence. Maine saw nine of those deaths in 2021.
Vehicles were the cause of death for 14 of the negligent homicides, with victims ranging in age from 7 to 79. Four of those deaths were from one crash in Castine on Dec. 10, 2022, when a car carrying seven Maine Maritime Academy students hit a tree.
There were eight justifiable homicides compared with five in 2021. Of those, four people were killed by police and four killed by citizens.
A total of 2.9 percent of reported assaults in 2022 were domestic, compared with 3.2 percent in 2021.
A total of 40 people were kidnapped or abducted in 2022, compared with 25 in 2021. Fewer people were victims of intimidation in 2022, with 4,407 cases compared with 4,626. Intimidation is when someone uses threatening words or conduct to cause fear without using a weapon or physical attack.
Nearly twice as many females were victims of violent crime than males, with 929 incidents compared with 488. Males were almost 10 times as likely to commit violent crimes with 1,147 offenders compared with 174 female offenders.
The most violent crimes were committed against people 25 to 34 years old, with 361 incidents. Children 10 and younger and people 65 and older had the fewest violent crimes committed against them, with 46 incidents in each age group.
Most sex offenses were committed in a home, with 261. The second most common location was a commercial building, with 49, the report said. The vast majority of sex offenses, 717, were committed by an acquaintance, family member or intimate partner of the victim. There were 27 committed by a stranger and 108 instances where information about the offender was missing.
Maine had 20 fewer robberies in 2022, with 142. More men were robbed, 83, compared with 62 women. And more men committed robberies,108, compared with 27 women.
There were 160 cases of arson in 2022, compared with 168 in 2021. Vandalism and destruction of property decreased by about 400 incidents, from 6,235 in 2021 to 5,791 in 2022. Shoplifting increased from 2,449 incidents in 2021 to 3,262 in 2022.
Thefts across the state did increase, with 11,400 reports in 2022 compared with 10,794 in 2021. That does not include vehicles, of which 1,020 were stolen in 2022 and 910 in 2021.
The vast majority of drug offenses were people possessing or concealing drugs, with 2,692 incidents. The second next most common was distributing or selling drugs, with 609.
The full report is available on the state of Maine’s website.