What's in this dataset?

Spreadsheet of “low-level” arrests made in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts from 2012 to 2017. Includes county, arresting agency, date of arrest, offense, arrestee age (except for Suffolk County), arrestee gender (except for Suffolk County), and arrestee race.

Note that it is not clear how race and ethnicity were determined.

Download Data from GitHub
Number of Files 1
File Type CSV
Total File Size 14.3 MB
Number of Rows 104,913
Number of Columns 12

Background

In 2017, ACLUM filed a public records request with the Executive Office of Public Safety and Security (EOPSS) seeking information about arrests for a variety of lowlevel offenses in the Commonwealth. The above data was collected from over 300 police departments through the National Incident Based Reporting System (NIBRS) process.

The following charges were considered lowlevel for the purposes of this request:

  • Drug possession (possession of any illicit drug or drug paraphernalia)
  • Driving with a suspended license, driving with expired registration, driving without a
    license, and driving without insurance
  • Disorderly conduct (including the following: Affray, Disorderly Conduct, Misuse Of
    Flag, Disturb At School, Disturb Funeral Procession, Disturb At Public Assembly,
    Disturb Peace, Disorderly Person, Disturb Peace, Lewd & Lascivious Speech &
    Behavior)
  • Trespassing
  • Curfew/Loitering/Vagrancy Violations
Public Records Request