Murder, Robbery, Rape, Burglary, Arson, Accidents and ... Cat Bites?

The Laguna Beach Police Department on Tuesday released its annual crime statistics report.

The numbers aren't too surprising—some are slightly up, others are slightly down. As far as violent crimes go, the report says that in 2012, there were 6 reports of forcible rape (same as 2011), 7 reports of robbery (6 in 2011) and 42 reports of aggravated assault (down from 50 in 2011). There was also one homicide in 2012—the city's first since the 2009 murder of Damon Nicholson.

There were 123 burglaries in 2012, six more than 2011; 399 accounts of larceny, down from 466 the year previous; one extra vehicle theft report (25) than in 2011; and four cases of arson—up from 2011's single incident, but still way fewer than the 12 that were reported in 2007.

Drunk driving arrests, felony arrests, traffic accidents, parking tickets (40,050 handed out in 2012, which allowed the city to rake in a cool $1.4 million) ... if you're nuts about stats, you'll have a field day going over the report, which we've included up there in the PDF box on the right, just click it and peruse yourself ...

But here's what we find most fascinating: The report also includes data from the city's animal services department, and while we think it's awesome that dog and cat adoptions from the city animal shelter were way up last year, we noticed there were also six reports of ... cat bites.

Dog bites, we get—50 of those in 2012—but cats? Your humble Laguna Beach Patch editor is not and never will be a cat dude (dogs are way better), but ... don't you have to be seriously atagonizing a cat for it to attack and bite you so severely that you feel the need to call the authorities and report a felonious feline? Just asking ...