Top 10 Dangerous Cities
For Poverty and Crime.

Poverty and Crime go hand in hand when law enforcement is weak or inadequate; or when drugs, corruption and powerful criminal elements combine to threaten normal law abiding citizens.

Danger from Poverty and Crime.

Top 10 Most Dangerous Cities:

1. Caracas, Venezuela:
   Population: 3.2 million.
   * 233 murders per 100,000 inhabitants... (ref: Overseas Security Advisory Council/U.S. Dept of State, July 2011).
   
   * The New York Times reported 8/22/2010 (Simon Romero)... "In Iraq, a country with about the same population as Venezuela, there were 4,644 civilian deaths from violence in 2009; in Venezuela that year, the number of murders climbed above 16,000.
   Even Mexico's infamous drug war has claimed fewer lives."
   
   
2. San Pedro Sula, Honduras :
   Population: 873,824 (ref: Wikipedia).
   *159 homicides per 100,000 in 2011.
   
   * The second largest city in Honduras, San Pedro Sula generates two thirds of the country's Gross Domestic Product.
   
   One person is murdered every 88 minutes in Honduras.
   
   
3. Ciudad Juarez, Mexico:
   Population: 1.34 million.
   * 148 murders per 100,000 inhabitants in 2011 (ref: Citizen's Council for Public Security, Mexico).
   
   * Ciudad Juarez drops from No.1 spot last year down from 220 murders per 100,000. But tension is rising again as the New Generation Juarez drug cartel challenges the Sinaloa cartel's control and threatens to kill a police officer a day. 2,000 police officers are spending off-duty hours in safe houses and hotels.
   * 4 severed heads delivered to police station in October 2008.
   * Hundreds of female factory workers murdered... 3,000 missing.
   * 60,000 killed in Mexico's drug wars (ref: Huffington Post Sept. 7 2012).
   
   
4. Maceio, Brazil:
   Population: 1.16 million.
   * 135 murders per 100,000 inhabitants.
   
   *Situated in Brazil's north-east state of Alagoas, Maceio "is scarred by poverty and extreme inequality" (ref: The Economist Jun 9th 2011).
   
   
5. Acapulco, Mexico:
   Population: 804,412 .
   * 128 murders per 100,000 inhabitants... (ref: Overseas Security Advisory Council/U.S. Dept of State July 2011).
   
   
   
6. Guatemala City, Guatemala:
   Population: 2.66 million.
   * Around 83 murders per 100,000 inhabitants.
   * "Guatemala has one of the highest violent crime rates in Latin America with around 40 murders a week in Guatemala City alone... There are no "safe areas" in Guatemala City"... British Foreign & Commonwealth Office, June 2011.
   
   
7. Cali, Colombia:
   Population: 2.21 million.
   * 78 murders per 100,000 inhabitants.
   * Semana magazine writes over 1,700 assassins roam the city (ref: Wikipedia).
   * Neo-military groups Los Urabenas and Los Rastrojos battle each other for the drug trade.
   * The Dept. of Administration Security warns both local civilians and foreigners of a high risk of bombings, murders, and kidnappings.
   
   
8. New Orleans, U.S.A.:
   Population: 360,740 (was 455,000 pre Hurricane Katrina in 2005).
   * 58 homicides per 100,000 in 2011... down from 64 killings per 100,000 in 2008 (ref: Reuters Jan 19, 2012).
   
   
9. Detroit, U.S.A. :
   Population: 706,585.
   * Homicide rate 49 per 100,000 in 2011.
   *Detroit's population peaked in 1950 at 1.8 million.
   
   
10. Cape Town, South Africa:
    Population: 3.5 million.
    * Homocide rate 47 per 100,000 inhabitants.
    * Gated estates with high perimeter walls, guard dogs and electric fences are popular in South Africa.
    * Rated "critical for crime" by U.S. Dept. of State Bureau of Diplomatic Security.
    
    

The entrenched poverty and crime problems in some of these cities assures them of a place in this infamous Top 10 Most Dangerous Cities well into the future.