Imperial, CA has a A+ safety grade (91/100) with a violent crime rate of 77 per 100,000, 78% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · mid-size city
Imperial (21,980 people) sits in the mid-size municipal band. This page opens with per-100,000 FBI UCR rates, then CA and national benchmarks.
Data updated 2026-08-24
Imperial, CA carries a PlainCrime A+ safety grade with violent crime 78% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Imperial, CA shows violent crime at 77.3 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 182 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 78% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade A+ from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
Small-count caution
Imperial reported 17 violent offences in 2024 against a population of 21,980. At this volume one additional or one fewer report moves the per-100,000 rate noticeably, so the figure is better read as a data point than as a precise measurement, and year-to-year swings here are expected.
Position in the state cohort
At 77.3 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Imperial ranks 440 of 458 — above 18 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is -76.8% against the cohort median of 333.1. Cities that did not report, or that reported implausibly low totals, are excluded from this cohort rather than counted as low-crime.
2020–2024 direction
Across 4 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 48.6 per 100,000 in 2020 to 77.3 in 2024 (+59.2%). The highest observed value was 161.6 in 2023 and the lowest 48.6 in 2020. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Comparable rate records
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Imperial's 77.3 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are Los Altos (77.8), Diamond Bar (78.2), Lafayette (80.2), Rancho Santa Margarita (81.1). 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.
Offense mix
Violent offenses are 29.8% of the 57 Part I offenses reported in Imperial for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 12.7 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.
Property-offense composition
Larceny-theft is 57.5% of reported property offenses in Imperial, against a cohort median of 69.5%. The remainder is burglary (7) and motor vehicle theft (10). Composition differences of this size usually track what kinds of places and property are present in a jurisdiction.
Property counts dominate Imperial'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.
Based on 17 reported violent incidents in a population of 21,980. At this volume, one additional or one fewer report can shift the rate and letter grade noticeably; small-city crime counts are inherently more volatile year to year than large-city counts, so treat this grade as a data point, not a precise ranking.
Mid-size municipal totals above are reported offenses, not safety advice for any single block. Reporting completeness still varies by year and agency.
Across 6.3 Census sq mi, Imperial logged 6.3 property and 2.7 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Imperial leans on larceny-theft at 40% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 2,795.
Violent offenses are 30% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Imperial offense mix (2024)
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (6.3 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
| Offense | Count | Rate /100K |
|---|---|---|
| Property Crime | 40 | 182 |
| Larceny-Theft | 23 | 104.6 |
| Motor Vehicle Theft | 10 | 45.5 |
| Burglary | 7 | 31.8 |
| Arson | 1 | 4.5 |
| Violent Crime | 17 | 77.3 |
| Aggravated Assault | 15 | 68.2 |
| Rape | 2 | 9.1 |
| Murder | 0 | 0 |
| Robbery | 0 | 0 |
The chart omits 2021 rather than drawing an unsupported zero or partial-coverage dip. The table preserves the year and marks the gap.
Lead series · fell across 4 comparable years · FBI UCR
Secondary series · rose · 2020-2024 · FBI UCR
| Year | Coverage | Population | Violent Rate | Property Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | Comparable | 18,528 | 48.6 | 296.8 |
| 2021 | Insufficient reporting | 20,228 | - | - |
| 2022 | Comparable | 21,626 | 92.5 | 383.8 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 21,654 | 161.6 | 286.3 |
| 2024 | Comparable | 21,980 | 77.3 | 182 |
Imperial Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Imperial's 57 reported offenses (4-year span 2020-2024, with internal gaps).
This agency reports via NIBRS, the incident-based system that captures more detail per offense (multiple crimes per incident, victim/offender data) than the older summary counts.
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the California cities closest to Imperial in population. Their populations run from 21,199 to 22,570, against 21,980 here. Or use our side-by-side compare tool to benchmark two cities directly.
Imperial sits at 77.3/100K violent (grade A+); the California cities below are the nearest matches after size peers are removed.
Imperial at 77.3/100K violent and 182/100K property - matched below outside California (≥10k pop, latest UCR vintage; not the in-state lists above).
77.3/100K here; nearest out-of-state matches.
182/100K here; violent-rate peers above excluded.
In 2024, Imperial reported 17 violent crimes and 40 property crimes, for a total of 57 reported offenses.
From 2023 to 2024, Imperial's violent crime rate decreased by 52.2%, and the property crime rate decreased by 36.4%.
The most common crime type in Imperial is larceny-theft, accounting for 40.4% of all reported crimes (23 incidents in 2024).
Mid-size read: Imperial figures are FBI UCR CIUS Table 8 (vintage 2024), population-adjusted per 100,000.
Denominators are the reporting-year population on the municipal row. Incomplete years are dropped from rankings. Confirm at FBI Crime Data Explorer and Census.gov QuickFacts.
Disclaimer (mid-size municipal): figures are informational, not advice. FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program is the source. Consult a professional before decisions.
Mid-size rate methodology for how Imperial's mid-size city row is sourced and ranked.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program CIUS Table 8 municipal crime rates · 2024 Imperial, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.
Bulk download: city crime dataset (CSV/JSON)
Every figure on PlainCrime is rendered directly from FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) source data, no number is typed in by an editor. Imperial is scored in the mid-size municipal band (21,980 on the row). See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.