The Ohio Revised Code (ORC) requires law enforcement agencies to report felony arrests to BCI. When an individual charged with a felony offense is not arrested, the incident is not reported to BCI until after the individual is fingerprinted in connection with their first court appearance or taken into custody. When a felony case results in a conviction or is otherwise disposed of, the clerk of court reports that information to BCI. However, not all arrests result in criminal charges, and not all criminal charges result in convictions.
Arrest and conviction information has historically been submitted to BCI as paper records. As agencies began to submit records electronically, they were required to submit them according to the published Electronic-Disposition-Specifications. Issues with data quality do exist because not every agency sends sentencing information in the prescribed format.
Even when conviction information is submitted in the prescribed format, it can be incomplete or improperly coded. In such cases, BCI may have a record of conviction but cannot display sentencing information that was improperly coded.
The Ohio Attorney General's Office (AGO) continues to identify methods to improve the transparency of sentencing information and will refine the data available through this dashboard over time.
When imposing a felony sentence, a judge must consider ORC Sections 2929.11, 2929.12, and other applicable provisions of the Revised Code. Unless a prison term is required, the sentencing judge has broad discretion in deciding whether to impose a prison term.
First- and second-degree felonies carry a presumption that a prison sentence will be imposed. Third-degree felonies generally carry no presumption regarding a prison sentence unless specified by statute. Fourth- and fifth-degree felonies generally carry a presumption against a prison sentence unless specified by statute.
A small number of serious criminal offenses are unclassified in that they do not conform to the general offense categories.
Data accessible through this dashboard is sourced from arrest and convictions records submitted to BCI by local criminal justice agencies. Included are arrest data submitted by local law enforcement agencies across all 88 Ohio counties and disposition data submitted by both Common Pleas and Municipal courts in Ohio.
The dashboard displays records from 2017 to the present (roughly the most recent 10 years). Data refreshes periodically as new records are added to the CCH system. In the coming months, data spanning a broader date range will be added, as will more granular sentencing information.
The dashboard currently encompasses only felony offenses, a focus chosen to provide a clearer view of serious criminal activity and avoid confusion with the high-volume misdemeanor records (traffic, low-level theft, etc.) that would otherwise dominate the counts. In the coming months, certain misdemeanor offenses that give rise to firearms disabilities will be added.
The Arrests page provides visibility into three top-line counts that look similar but answer different questions:
"Top" offenses refer to those occurring most frequently based on the filters and criteria selected. For example, if a user selects ORC Section "2913" and limits the search to "Darke County," the results displayed will be the most frequently occurring offenses reported for Darke County that begin with "2913." As many as 10 total offenses and five violent offenses will be displayed.
The "violent" designation comes from ORC Section 2901.01(A)(9)(a), which enumerates the statutory list of "offenses of violence" — including, among others, aggravated murder, murder, manslaughter, felonious assault, kidnapping, rape, robbery, aggravated burglary, domestic violence, and discharge of a firearm on or near prohibited premises. Any felony arrests whose statute matches an entry in the list (including its subsections) is flagged as violent in the chart.