Picture of two guns seized by police

By Lara Fominoff

Lethbridge ranks 34th on Maclean’s Magazine’s “Canada’s Most Dangerous Places 2020” list

Nov 19, 2019 | 3:45 PM

LETHBRIDGE, AB – Out of 237 small, medium and large cities across the country, according to Maclean’s Magazine list of “Canada’s Most Dangerous Places 2020,” Lethbridge now sits in 34th place overall, and in fifth spot compared with all other Alberta cities ranked.

That’s compared with third place overall last year.

According to the magazine, the report ranks communities according to the Statistics Canada Crime Severity Index. It also considers not just overall crime- but a variety of violent and non- violent crimes.

In July, Lethbridge landed on the Stats Canada CSI in the number one position according to numbers in the 2018 Crime Index.

The methodology MacLean’s uses is different than that of Stats Canada. According to author Marie Danielle Smith, “We use(d) StatsCan’s Crime Severity Index—a number different from the general crime rate that measures both the volume and severity of crimes in a municipality as compared to the national average—to compare 237 urban centres that have a population of 10,000 or more.”

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The most recent data available was used from 2018, which was release on July 22, 2019.

The average Canadian CSI is 75.01, while Lethbridge’s is 159. According to the list, while Lethbridge has had no homicides, the rate and number of other crimes are sometimes twice or three times the national average.

Those include sexual assaults, fraud, drug-related crimes and break and enters. The following is a list of Lethbridge’s numbers, compared with the Canadian average in brackets.

• Assault rate (incidents per 100,00 population) – 1,051.94 (457.01)
• Firearms Offences rate – 10.11 (7.58)
• Robbery rate – 62.65 (60.58)
• Breaking and Entering rate – 883.19 (431.24)
• Fraud rate – 1,194.42 (349.2)
• Impaired Driving rate – 300.12 (190.42)
• Cannabis trafficking or production rate – 10.11 (22.5)
• Cocaine trafficking rate – 33.05 (20.03)
• Other controlled drugs, trafficking or production rate – 186.94 (31.58)
• Youth Criminal Justice Act rate – 34.36 (31.58)

Thompson, Manitoba took the top spot for the Most Dangerous Place in Canada 2020, followed by North Battleford, Saskatchewan.

The top five cities in Alberta are as follows: Wetaskiwin (6th), Grande Prairie (23rd), Edmonton (25th), Fort McMurray (30th), and Lethbridge (34th).

Red Deer Ranked 37th, while Medicine Hat took 83rd spot. The full report list can be found here: https://www.macleans.ca/canadas-most-dangerous-places-2020/