Crime is indeed very high - murder rate per capita is 15 times higher than in the U.S. or 70 times that of United Kingdom.
It is so high that the government has stopped publishing statistics, and also so high that "authorities would assign judicial police to Caracas area morgues to speak with families. At that time, they would advise families not to speak to report the murder of their family member to the media in exchange to have the process of recovering the victims body in an expedited manner. It was also reported that police would intercept the families of the victims and take them to the library of the University Institute of the Scientific Police (IUPOLC) where authorities offered families ways to "streamline procedures and advise them not to give information to the press in return for their aid"*
It is so high that the government has stopped publishing statistics, and also so high that "authorities would assign judicial police to Caracas area morgues to speak with families. At that time, they would advise families not to speak to report the murder of their family member to the media in exchange to have the process of recovering the victims body in an expedited manner. It was also reported that police would intercept the families of the victims and take them to the library of the University Institute of the Scientific Police (IUPOLC) where authorities offered families ways to "streamline procedures and advise them not to give information to the press in return for their aid"*
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Venezuela
The government also banned private handgun ownership in 2012. The number of murders has grown by about a third since that.