Are most murder suspects men or women?
In all 67 countries and territories with a UNODC figure from 2018 or later, most people arrested or suspected for intentional homicide were recorded as male: the median share is 89.36%, from 75.64% in Hungary (2024) to 100.00% in Belize (2022). These are police suspects, not convicted offenders.
% of homicide suspects who were male (where sex was recorded)
0%25%50%75%100%
Mostly womenMostly men
Year varies by country (2009–2024) · grey: no figure
Latest figure for each country
Each colour is one figure per country: one year, not an average, for the year shown in the ranking and when you point at a country.With "How sure" on, hatching marks countries whose latest figure has a trust score below 60 (Low or Very low).
All countries
Each source's value links to its publisher; point at it for the source and year. A value in brackets is shown but doesn't count, and pointing at it says why. Retrieved 2026-10-26, 2026-10-27.
About this data
Every source on this page (2)
Who is behind the sources
- 100% International body
Each publisher, its funding and its own description
- UNODC · International bodyFunding: Mostly voluntary contributions from member states, multilateral organisations and private donors. sourceIn its own words: “The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) advances justice and security around the globe…” source, retrieved 2026-10-27
- Eurostat · International bodyFunding: EU budget; Eurostat is a Directorate-General of the European Commission. The gender-based violence survey was run with the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) and the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE), also EU-funded. sourceIn its own words: “Our mission is to provide high-quality statistics and data on Europe.” source, retrieved 2026-10-27
- UNODC Data Portal, persons arrested/cautioned/suspectedUsed for 89 countries; counts toward 89. Years 2009 to 2024. Retrieved 2026-10-26.Open the publisher's pageData (Excel file)
- Eurostat, intentional homicide by legal status and sex (crim_hom_soff)Used for 30 countries; counts toward 0 (shown only). Years 2014 to 2024. Retrieved 2026-10-27.Not counted where: it republishes UNODC.Open the publisher's page
Why the numbers differ (4)
- Countries record suspects differently: some count everyone arrested, others everyone the police name as a suspect or caution, and some count each person once per case rather than once per year.
- Where some suspects have no sex recorded, or the counts by sex do not add up to the total, the share describes only the suspects whose sex was recorded.
- Where suspects number only in the dozens, one or two people more or less move the share by several points from one year to the next.
- Eurostat and UNODC publish the same national replies for European countries; where their counts differ, one of the two has a later revision or a different reading of the same reply.
Common mistakes (3)
- Suspects are not convicted offenders. A suspect is someone the police arrested, cautioned or recorded as suspected; some are never charged and some are acquitted. Persons convicted by sex is a different number, published by Eurostat for European countries but not by UNODC.
- Unsolved homicides have no suspect, so the share describes the cases where the police identified someone, not every homicide.
- The share describes recorded suspects in homicide cases. It says nothing about any individual man or woman.
Context (2)
Sources considered and not used (8)
- UNODC intentional homicide file, suspects by sex and age: This file splits suspects by sex only within age bands and gives no all-ages total per sex. Summing the bands gives different counts from UNODC's own totals by sex in 406 of 641 country-years, so it was not used. Some places appear only there and so have no row: Argentina, Bhutan, Brazil, Faroe Islands, Monaco, Puerto Rico, United Kingdom (England and Wales), United Kingdom (Northern Ireland), United Kingdom (Scotland), Uzbekistan. (source, retrieved 2026-10-25)
- UNODC, persons convicted for intentional homicide: Published only as a total for both sexes in both UNODC files, with no split by sex. (source, retrieved 2026-10-25)
- Rows with too few suspects: Fewer than 20 suspects of recorded sex in the latest year with a split by sex, where one person moves the share by several points: Andorra (2015), Antigua and Barbuda (2024), Barbados (2024), Cyprus (2024), Dominica (2024), Grenada (2023), Iceland (2024), Liechtenstein (2016), Luxembourg (2022), China, Macao Special Administrative Region (2024), Malta (2024), Montenegro (2024), Singapore (2024), Holy See (2022), Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (2024). (source, retrieved 2026-10-26)
- Rows where sex is mostly unrecorded: Sex is recorded for fewer than half of the suspects in the latest year with a split by sex, so the share would describe a minority of them: Bolivia (Plurinational State of) (2023), Botswana (2009), Guatemala (2024), Senegal (2016). (source, retrieved 2026-10-26)
- UNODC, Central Iraq: A sub-national part of Iraq with no national figure.
- Eurostat, suspected persons by sex (crim_just_sex): Covers all offences together, not intentional homicide; the homicide table crim_hom_soff is used instead.
- United Kingdom: UNODC has no all-ages split by sex for England and Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland, and Eurostat's table has no United Kingdom rows.
- National police statistics: National police tables are the figures countries send to UNODC and Eurostat, so they would be the same collection rather than an independent source. No independent second source of suspects by sex was found, so every row rests on one collection.
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