> It's not that there is a chance that you'll get mugged, it's that it's likely it'll happen.
Fake news: there's actually very few places where this would be true. You are being told that because in these countries most people are poor and afraid of losing their hard earned money/stuff more than in America generally. Doesn't mean it's likely to happen at all. Most of the times directly violent crimes don't pay as well as drug dealing, and the criminals sure know it: there's favelas in Sao Paulo and Rio where if there's a thief on the territory, drug gangs will hunt him down: they know drug clients need to feel secure to go in there and spend money.
Once I had my car stolen near the uni I was attending, and also near a favela. One of my colleagues lived there, and I told him the fact: next day he told me drug gangs assured him, and he was assuring me, that they would investigate and if the thief was found to be a local resident they would find him and return my car. The car was found 2 days after the fact, in very bad condition with a hole underneath the motor (they were probably using it to go into ramps/offroad), by the police, in another favela a few miles away - by the looks of it, the thiefs didn't want to gain money on this: they took the car only to have drinks and fun and trash it, then abandon it.