Highland, CA has a D safety grade (35/100) with a violent crime rate of 535 per 100,000, 52% above the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
Highland, CA Crime Rate & Safety
At 55,936 residents, Highland is a large city: FBI UCR Table 8 rates (per 100,000) here are read against CA and U.S. averages before the offense-family breakdown.
Highland, CA carries a PlainCrime D safety grade with violent crime 52% above the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Highland, CA shows violent crime at 534.5 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 1,322.9 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 52% above the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade D from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
D safety grade
534.5/100K violent
1322.9/100K property
+52% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Highland, CA
Comparable rate records
Highland's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the California cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Highland's 534.5 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Imperial Beach (538.7), Grass Valley (540.2), South Gate (525.6), Salinas (524.5). These are same-year agency submissions that pass the same completeness screen, not a claim that the cities have identical conditions. They make the cohort position above checkable against named records instead of a generic state average.
Position in the state cohort
Highland reported a higher violent-crime rate than most comparable California cities
At 534.5 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Highland ranks 112 of 458 — above 346 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is +62.7% against the cohort median of 328.5. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
Offense mix
Violent offenses make up an unusually large share of the reported mix
Violent offenses are 28.8% of the 1,039 Part I offenses reported in Highland for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 11.7 points. Offense mix is shaped by which agencies report and how incidents are classified as well as by the underlying offenses, so it describes the reported record rather than a settled difference in conditions.
2020–2024 direction
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window lower
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 680.8 per 100,000 in 2020 to 534.5 in 2024 (-21.5%). The highest observed value was 726.7 in 2022 and the lowest 222.8 in 2023. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property-offense composition
Burglary and vehicle theft carry more of the property total than they do across the cohort
Larceny-theft is 55.1% of reported property offenses in Highland, against a cohort median of 69.5%. The remainder is burglary (112) and motor vehicle theft (220). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Property counts dominate Highland's FBI UCR Table 8 municipal row. Per-100,000 rates use the reporting-year population on that row; cities that fail the completeness test stay out of rate rankings. A citywide figure rarely describes any single neighbourhood inside the municipal boundary.
On a large city row, these are citywide reported offense totals - not neighbourhood advice. Conditions vary by place and time; reporting rates differ across jurisdictions.
Highland's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 18.6 Census sq mi, Highland logged 39.8 property and 16.1 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Highland leans on larceny-theft at 39% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 2,585.
Violent offenses are 29% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (18.6 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Violent rate moved most (2023→2024)
Violent Crime Rate
+139.9%
222.8 → 534.5/100K
Property Crime Rate
+64%
806.5 → 1322.9/100K
Property offenses lead Highland's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs CA
Property Crime
740
1322.9
1985.9
Larceny-Theft
408
729.4
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
220
393.3
-
Burglary
112
200.2
-
Arson
14
25
-
Violent Crime
299
534.5
476.8
Aggravated Assault
217
387.9
-
Robbery
65
116.2
-
Rape
13
23.2
-
Murder
4
7.2
-
Highland Crime Trend (2020-2024)
The chart omits 2021 rather than drawing an unsupported zero or partial-coverage dip. The table preserves the year and marks the gap.
Highland property crime rate trend
Lead series · fell across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
Highland Police Department
Reporting agency for Highland Summary Reporting (SRS)
Highland Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Highland's 1,039 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
This agency reports via the traditional Summary Reporting System (SRS): aggregate monthly offense counts rather than incident-level detail.
Similar-Size Cities in California
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the California cities closest to Highland in population. Their populations run from 54,915 to 57,584, against 55,936 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
Highland at 534.5/100K violent and 1,322.9/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
In 2024, Highland reported 299 violent crimes and 740 property crimes, for a total of 1,039 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Highland?
From 2023 to 2024, Highland's violent crime rate increased by 139.9%, and the property crime rate increased by 64%.
What is the most common crime in Highland?
The most common crime type in Highland is larceny-theft, accounting for 39.3% of all reported crimes (408 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Highland's rates come from the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, CIUS Table 8, vintage 2024.
Incomplete reporters stay out of rate rankings. Cross-check population with Census ACS; state UCR programs for statewide context. Primary verify links: FBI.gov UCR, Census QuickFacts.
Disclaimer (large city): informational crime rates only - not legal, insurance, or personal-safety advice. Source: FBI UCR. Ask a qualified professional before acting.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Highland, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.