District Of Columbia's comparable FBI window (2014–2024, 11 years) shows declines on both major offense rates — charts below keep the larger |endpoint| move first.
Declining-window verdict
District Of Columbia's violent crime rate fell 18.4% from 2014 to 2024; its property crime rate fell 28.5%. The endpoints agree on the broad direction, but the intervening years still matter.
Latest national comparison
For 2024, the state rate was 1015.2 per 100,000 versus 352.0 across the state records in this dataset, a gap of 188.4% above. This is a state-level benchmark, not a neighborhood-safety conclusion.
Recent direction check
From 2021 to 2024, the violent-crime rate rose 135.7%, compared with -18.4% across the full 2014-2024 window. That difference is why the latest few observations should be read separately from the decade-scale endpoints.
Peak and trough
The highest observed violent-crime rate was 1270.1 in 2015; the lowest was 430.7 in 2021. The latest value lies 70% of the way from that low to that peak, which shows whether the endpoint is close to an extreme or near the middle of the observed range.
Year-to-year movement
The largest annual change ran from 2021 to 2022: +89.9%. Across the full sequence, 4 year-to-year steps rose by more than 1% and 5 fell by more than 1%. A single sharp step can reflect participation or reporting changes as well as a real change in recorded offenses.
Full-window endpoints
Violent crime moved from 1244.4 to 1015.2 per 100,000 (-18.4%). Property crime moved from 5214.4 to 3725.9 (-28.5%). These are endpoint comparisons, not proof that every intervening year followed the same direction.
Rate denominator
The reported population changed from 658,893 to 702,250 (+6.6%). Rates account for that denominator change; raw offense counts do not. This is one reason a count and a per-100,000 rate can move by different percentages over the same years.
FBI UCR figures reflect offenses reported to law enforcement and submitted by participating agencies. On District Of Columbia's property-led trend window, a sharp property-rate change can reflect reporting participation, a definition update, or the NIBRS transition as well as a real change in recorded offenses. Rates use the reported population denominator; unreported crime is outside this dataset.
| Year | Coverage | Population | Property | Rate | YoY | Violent | Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | Comparable | 702,250 | 26,165 | 3725.9 | ↓ 14.1% | 7,129 | 1015.2 |
| 2023 | Comparable | 678,972 | 29,438 | 4335.7 | ↑ 21.1% | 7,852 | 1156.5 |
| 2022 | Comparable | 671,803 | 24,047 | 3579.5 | ↑ 104.0% | 5,495 | 817.9 |
| 2021 | Comparable | 670,050 | 11,756 | 1754.5 | ↓ 50.2% | 2,886 | 430.7 |
| 2020 | Comparable | 712,816 | 25,108 | 3522.4 | ↓ 19.8% | 7,127 | 999.8 |
| 2019 | Comparable | 705,749 | 30,981 | 4389.8 | ↓ 0.3% | 7,403 | 1049 |
| 2018 | Comparable | 702,455 | 30,921 | 4401.8 | ↑ 2.0% | 6,995 | 995.8 |
| 2017 | Comparable | 693,972 | 29,960 | 4317.2 | ↓ 10.7% | 6,975 | 1005.1 |
| 2016 | Comparable | 681,170 | 32,931 | 4834.5 | ↑ 2.6% | 8,236 | 1209.1 |
| 2015 | Comparable | 672,228 | 31,683 | 4713.1 | ↓ 9.6% | 8,538 | 1270.1 |
| 2014 | Comparable | 658,893 | 34,357 | 5214.4 | - | 8,199 | 1244.4 |
Primary data source: FBI Crime Data Explorer, Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program. District Of Columbia's property-rate series cross-checks against FBI Crime in the United States annual release. Population figures reference U.S. Census Bureau estimates where FBI populations are unavailable. Rates are per 100,000 population.
Read our methodology , how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.