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Washington: Overall crime rate

The overall crime rate is calculated by dividing the total number reported incidences of serious crimes by the population. We multiply the result by 10,000. Total – or serious – crimes include violent crimes (murders and non-negligent manslaughter, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault) and non-violent crimes (burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft). In counties with relatively few people, a small change in the number of serious crimes reported may have a significant effect on rates from year to year.

In Washington ...

  • the rate in 2013 was 267 per 10,000 population, compared to 389 in the U.S..
 

To get the most out of this indicator . . .

 

Ask questions:

 

·         Does your county have a high or low overall crime rate?

·         Is this rate decreasing over time?

 

Look at other indicators:

 

·         “Crime: Violent crime rate” – How does the change in the overall crime rate compare to the change in the violent crime rate?

 

Dig deeper:

 

·         Look at the county rankings for your state to see how your county compares to others.

·         The Federal Bureau of Investigation provides crime data for specific offenses.  Be aware, however, that data are reported by type of law enforcement agency (city, county, university, other) rather than as county totals.  See http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm.

·         Take a Big Picture view of your county.

·         If you have specific questions, send us an e-mail.



Note: Number of reported incidences of serious crimes (murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, robbery, aggravated assault, burglary, larceny-theft, and motor vehicle theft) per 10,000 population. Serious crimes include both violent and non-violent. Limitation of the Data: The FBI's Uniform Crime Report (UCR) is a voluntary program, whereby participating law enforcement agencies report incidents of seven selected serious crimes. Local agencies may classify reported crimes differently, causing comparability problems at the community level. 2001 estimates of total population have been updated per the Census Bureau's updates. NA = not available. For more detailed notes, please visit the data sources.

Source: 2003-2013: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reports, (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm);
Source: 1990-2002: National Archive of Criminal Justice Data, Uniform Crime Reporting Program Data, (http://www.icpsr.umich.edu/NACJD;); 1990-2002: Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reports, (http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm); and 2000-2002: University of Virginia Library, Geostats Center, Uniform Crime Reports County Data, (http://fisher.lib.virginia.edu/collections/stats/crime/);
DATE LAST UPDATED: September 2, 2015.

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