There were 50,274 crimes reported in the City of Los Angeles in the first quarter of this year — an 8% dip from the same period the previous year.

For burglaries and burglary attempts, the dip has been even steeper, falling by 13% from the first quarter of 2018. Homicides are down by 15%.

However, the City of Los Angeles, with over four million inhabitants spread out over 500 square miles, is a big place, and people’s experience with public safety can vary dramatically. In Bel Air, for instance, overall reported crimes fell by 55% — the most improved of any neighborhood. Playa del Rey on the other hand saw a 67% increase.

“Factors such as changes in population density and relationships with law enforcement can have a big impact on the crime rates in LA’s neighborhoods,” said Vickie Jensen, a criminologist and the department chair of Criminology and Justice Studies at California State University, Northridge. “If more people decided to move into Playa Vista and that caused a higher population density, that could just statistically create more opportunity for crime.”

We examined crimes reported to the LAPD for 110 Los Angeles neighborhoods from Jan. 1 – March 31, 2019 and ranked them according to crime rate. Downtown had the highest crime rate in the city while Bel Air had the lowest.

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