Crime in 2005 declined 1% vs. 2004.  One would have to go back nearly five decades to 1957 to find a year in which Santa Monica’s overall crime was lower than it was in 2005.  According to official Uniform Crime Report (UCR) statistics submitted to the California Department of Justice, Santa Monica’s number of Part I Crimes fell from 2004’s modern era low level to a new low of 4,048 incidents.  Crime has fallen in 11 of the past 12 years in Santa Monica.

Leading the record overall decline in serious crime was a 28% decline in rapes to 21 incidents which, along with the same number of occurrences in 2003, was the lowest incidence of this crime since the mid-sixties.  Robberies, led by a 15% decrease in strong-arm robberies, bottomed out at their lowest point since the sixties to a total of 241 incidents.  Although total burglaries showed an increase 35 incidences (788 vs 753) in 2005, commercial burglaries declined 10 percent.  Despite the increase, total burglary numbers remain at lows not seen since 1957 or 48 years ago. 

The 2005 decrease in crime constitutes a 63 percent decline from 1993, a peak year in which Part I Crime figures were over 2.5% greater in number than today.  Santa Monica today is not the Santa Monica of 1957.  Increases in the city’s population of permanent residents and the massive jump in the number of daytime visitors and tourists must be considered to appreciate the magnitude of the increase in public safety.  In 2005, Santa Monica recorded 44.2 Part I Crimes per 1000 residents, making it the lowest crime year on record per capita for any one year period for which the City maintain crime records (going back to 1956).