Santee, CA has a B safety grade (70/100) with a violent crime rate of 254 per 100,000, 28% below the national average.
FBI UCR 2024 · per-capita rates · large city
Santee, CA Crime Rate & Safety
At 59,351 residents, Santee 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.
Santee, CA carries a PlainCrime B safety grade with violent crime 28% below the U.S. average
According to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program for 2024, Santee, CA shows violent crime at 254.4 per 100,000 residents and property crime at 571.2 per 100,000. Violent crime runs 28% below the U.S. average. PlainCrime assigns grade B from those rates. Figures are voluntary agency submissions joined to population denominators; incomplete coverage can move the number.
B safety grade
254.4/100K violent
571.2/100K property
-28% vs U.S.
What the 2024 FBI UCR record shows for Santee, CA
Comparable rate records
Santee's closest reported-rate comparisons are in the California cohort
The nearest comparable 2024 records to Santee's 254.4 violent-crime rate per 100,000 are San Jacinto (254.2), Novato (253.6), San Bruno (256.5), Newport Beach (251.8). 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 make up an unusually large share of the reported mix
Violent offenses are 30.8% of the 490 Part I offenses reported in Santee for 2024, against a median of 17.1% across comparable California cities — a gap of 13.7 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.
Position in the state cohort
Santee sits mid-pack among comparable California cities
At 254.4 reported violent offenses per 100,000 residents in 2024, Santee ranks 289 of 458 — above 169 of the 457 other California cities whose 2024 submission passes this site’s completeness test. That is -23.6% 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
The reported violent-crime rate ended the window lower
Across 5 comparable reporting years, the rate moved from 285.0 per 100,000 in 2020 to 254.4 in 2024 (-10.7%). The highest observed value was 295.2 in 2023 and the lowest 254.4 in 2024. Years whose submission failed the completeness test are left out of this comparison rather than plotted as change.
Property counts dominate Santee'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.
Santee's 2024 municipal footprint
Across 16.5 Census sq mi, Santee logged 20.5 property and 9.1 violent offenses per square mile in 2024.
Santee leans on larceny-theft at 45% of reported offenses, with a moderate mix index of 2,972.
Violent offenses are 31% of the municipal total; property offenses still dominate the count.
Density uses Census Gazetteer land area (16.5 sq mi); mix index is HHI x 10,000 on the offense-type shares above. Distinct from the per-100K rates in the hero.
Property rate moved most (2023→2024)
Property Crime Rate
-40.6%
962.4 → 571.2/100K
Violent Crime Rate
-13.8%
295.2 → 254.4/100K
Property offenses lead Santee's 2024 record
Offense
Count
Rate /100K
vs CA
vs US avg
Property Crime
339
571.2
1985.9
1711
Larceny-Theft
222
374
-
-
Motor Vehicle Theft
72
121.3
-
-
Burglary
45
75.8
-
-
Arson
7
11.8
-
-
Violent Crime
151
254.4
476.8
352
Aggravated Assault
119
200.5
-
-
Robbery
25
42.1
-
-
Rape
5
8.4
-
-
Murder
2
3.4
-
-
Santee Crime Trend (2020-2024)
Santee property crime rate trend
Lead series · fell across 5 comparable years · FBI UCR
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program · split lines are the U.S. national averages
Santee Police Department
Reporting agency for Santee NIBRS-participating
Santee Police Department filed the 2024 UCR row behind Santee's 490 reported offenses (5-year span 2020-2024).
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.
Similar-Size Cities in California
Crime rates read differently at different scales, so these are the California cities closest to Santee in population. Their populations run from 58,318 to 60,352, against 59,351 here. Or use our
side-by-side compare tool
to benchmark two cities directly.
In 2024, Santee reported 151 violent crimes and 339 property crimes, for a total of 490 reported offenses.
Is crime increasing or decreasing in Santee?
From 2023 to 2024, Santee's violent crime rate decreased by 13.8%, and the property crime rate decreased by 40.6%.
What is the most common crime in Santee?
The most common crime type in Santee is larceny-theft, accounting for 45.3% of all reported crimes (222 incidents in 2024).
Large-city read: Santee'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 Santee, CA rates use the reporting-year population on the municipal row.