South Dakota crime report: Serious crimes down, lesser offenses up overall in 2021

Dec. 28—PIERRE — Overall criminal offenses were down slightly in 2021 compared to 2020, with serious crimes also dropping while lesser offenses jumped, according to the latest Crime in South Dakota Report released by the state Wednesday.

The report, compiled yearly by the South Dakota Attorney General Office, the South Dakota Division of Criminal Investigation and the Criminal Statistical Analysis Center, is issued yearly and is used to help identify trends in criminal activity in the state.

"Criminal statistics are an indispensable asset to aid in identifying trends in criminal activity," Chad Mosteller, director of the Division of Criminal Investigation, said in a statement. "And that helps law enforcement officers and agencies in their efforts to keep South Dakota communities safe."

The latest edition of the report shows a slight decrease in total offenses with 69,277 overall offenses, a decrease of about 5.33% in 2021. Those offenses resulted in 38,160 arrests. Along with that, Group A offenses, which include crimes such as homicide, arson and sex offenses, also dropped to 46,334, a decrease of about 14.45%, though they did account for a total of 15,210 arrests.

Some of the more notable serious crimes statistics include:

* Murder decreased by 45.71%, dropping from 35 in 2020 to 19 in 2021.

* Forcible rape also decrased 10.22%, from 499 to 448 in 2021.

* Burglaries decreased by 21.49%, with 2,829 being reported in 2020. About 34.35% of burglaries, or 463, in 2021 were classified as forced entry.

* Juvenile arrests, at 3,828, accounted for 10.03% of total arrests. That is up from 3,694 in 2020, or 3.63%

* DUI arrests came in at 5,654 in 2021, an increase of 618 or 12.27% from a total of 5,036 reported in 2020.

* Total drug offenses were reported at 6,731 from 7,915 in 2020, marking a 14.96% decrease. In the last five years, drug offenses have decreased overall by 24.86%, with 8,404 drug offenses being reported in 2017.

In terms of Group B, which include crimes such as bad checks, disorderly conduct and driving under the influence, offense jumped 20.64% with 22,943 in 2021 as compared to 19,017 in 2020.

Maurice Waltner, who serves as chief deputy for Hutchinson County and will assume the role of sheriff on Jan. 3 after winning the seat in the November election, said the annual report serves as a bit of a canary in the coalmine. If there's a trend coming through in the statewide statistics, it's likely going to show up at the county level eventually.

"It's always helpful. In our nice little area, we're usually behind the trends, so once you see a trend starting somewhere else, we know the problem is here and we haven't seen it, or it's something we expect to start happening," said Waltner, who has been in law enforcement since 2004.

He said he generally agreed with the overall statistics reported, with some categories of crime having decreased. But others continue to be a problem. Intoxicated driving and, perhaps most prevalent, driver carelessness, has contributed to fatal crash numbers.

"I think the pandemic really slowed down your normal day-to-day crimes, like burglaries. We had decreased break-ins and decreased thefts. But just like that report shows, we saw increased DUIs," Waltner said. "Our big one is traffic fatalities."

While statewide drug offenses were down in the report, Waltner said drugs remain a major problem. Methamphetamine and fentanyl continue to pose a serious danger to the public, and with U.S. Highway 81 running through the county, he said he knows it's being transported through the area.

Reducing that danger is a constant goal, Waltner said.

"It's been a main goal of ours to crack down on it," Waltner said. "It's time for us to get out there and try to increase our patrols and stop some of these drugs coming through here. Slow people down and prevent drugs and traffic accidents. That's my main goal. I think our county is still a great and safe place to live, and so is South Dakota, as long as we all stay vigilant."

Steve Harr, sheriff of Davison County, also said the report is a valuable tool in assessing crime and agreed that the drug problem is an ongoing issue on which his office is trying to clamp down.

"As far as drug offenses go and DUIs, I can't imagine we're a whole lot off what we normally are. I don't know if I've seen a real spike in anything right off hand, but we also haven't seen lower numbers, either," Harr said. "Meth has been big for a long time, and we're starting to see fentanyl in the area. We even see it with marijuana. The marijuana isn't the stuff from the 60s, 70s and 80s. It's potent stuff."

While homicides were down statewide, Harr said Davison County had more than its fair share in recent years. He said at one point the Davison County jail held five suspects on murder charges. He said that was the only time he had seen something like that in his 23-year career with the sheriff's office.

"I would say violent crimes are up in this area. We've had several murder cases in the last year and a half. At one point we had five people housed in our jail on murder charges this year. It's the only time in my career I've seen it, and my career has all been spent with the sheriff's office here," Harr said.

It's disheartening to see crime, especially violent crime, trending upward locally, but Harr said Mitchell has a robust law enforcement community that includes the sheriff's office, the Mitchell Police Division and South Dakota Highway Patrol that are constantly working to keep the public safe.

"That's the goal. Public safety is the main goal. We're not out there to see how many speeding tickets we can write in a day," Harr said. "That is the big goal for everybody, it doesn't matter if it's the Mitchell Police Division, the sheriff's office or the South Dakota Highway Patrol."

The state report on crime is part of the arsenal he, his team and his law enforcement colleagues use to keep abreast of the latest threats.

"We use it to see what the trends are and what we need to concentrate on. It's good information for us to have," Harr said.

A note in the report indicates that some 2021 incident data was not included in the report due to technical issues with the record management system used by a majority of South Dakota local law enforcement agencies. That may account for major differences seen when comparing total numbers reported to prior years. The note also said that unexpected staffing changes made it impossible to audit any data received or any data missing for 2021.