San Diego Police Department Ford Police Interceptor Utility vehicle in 2015

The city government of San Diego tracks crime in San Diego and has published crime statistics since 1950. In San Diego, the crime rate is relatively low compared to the rest of the United States. Several news sources ranked San Diego within the top twenty safest cities in the United States since 2010. In 2017, the crime rate in San Diego was the lowest it had ever been since 1959. Despite the city's low crime rate, San Diego is a major port in the international illegal drug trade, especially when it comes to methamphetamine and fentanyl, produced and trafficked largely by the Sinaloa Cartel. In the 1980s, the city was called the meth capital of the United States, and in the 2020s, the city and the larger region became a national epicenter of fentanyl trafficking. The city has also faced scandals from public officials over the decades, with several mayors being forced to resign.

Overview

In 2006, Police Chief William Lansdowne said that San Diego became the sixth-safest city among those in the country with at least 500,000 people in 2004.[1] In 2005, the violent crime rate reached a 25-year low at 4.5 crimes per 1,000 population.[1] Since 2010, news organizations have included San Diego among the twenty safest cities in the United States: 9th in 2010 by Forbes,[2] 20th in 2012 by Business Insider,[3] and 12th in 2019 by U.S. News & World Report.[4] In 2017, the Federal Bureau of Investigation named San Diego the safest big city in the U.S. due to its homicide rate in 2016.[5] The violent crime rate of the city in 2017 was 3.7 per 1,000 people, the lowest among the ten most populous cities in the country.[6]

Crime rate

The following chart contains the annual crime rate per 1,000 population of the city of San Diego since 1950:[7]

10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
  •   Theft
  •   Vehicle theft
  •   Burglary
  •   Aggravated assault
  •   Robbery
  •   Rape
  •   Murder

Actual crimes

The following chart contains the actual crimes committed in the city of San Diego every year since 1950 (does not take population growth or decline into account):[8]

25,000
50,000
75,000
100,000
125,000
150,000
1950
1960
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010
2020
  •   Theft
  •   Vehicle theft
  •   Burglary
  •   Aggravated assault
  •   Robbery
  •   Rape
  •   Murder

Crime by category

Criminal organizations

As of 2014, there are 4,100 gang members in 91 gangs in the city of San Diego, according to police lieutenant Keith Lucas.[9] In 2013, the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) published a county-wide gang arrestees report on the preceding year and found that the average initiation age of gang members was 13.5 years and 61 percent of arrestees reported that they had family members who were also gang members.[10] In the report, the law enforcement agencies in the county informed SANDAG that gangs commit about a quarter of all crimes in the county.[9]

Drug trafficking

In 2006, the Drug Enforcement Administration discovered a drug tunnel operated by the Sinaloa Cartel in San Diego–Tijuana

In the 1980s, San Diego held the dubious distinction of being the meth capital of the United States. In the 1960s, the Hells Angels motorcycle club was the chief distributor of meth in the state, and production across the southern border in Mexico was mostly unimpeded by law enforcement, allowing for the drug to be widely available in San Diego.[11]

In 2000, the National Drug Intelligence Center published a threat assessment on drugs in the Southern District of California. It found that, while the California–Mexico border comprised about 7 percent of the southwest border, it made up 18 percent of the drug seizures in the region. The assessment stated that all drugs of abuse—meth, black tar heroin, and marijuana in particular—were readily available and supplied by Mexican drug trafficking organizations.[12] In 2014, California Attorney General Kamala Harris issued a report that stated that about 70 percent of the meth from Mexico came through San Diego's ports of entry, outpacing border communities in Arizona and Texas since 2009. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokesperson Lauren Mack hypothesized that the city's proximity to Mexico, its position on a central smuggling corridor, and its easy freeway access to points of high demand could be reasons for that fact. The spokesperson said that San Diego used to be a meth production hub, but production moved across the border into Tijuana and Baja California. Mack also stated that the Sinaloa Cartel played a significant role in the region's ongoing meth trade.[13]

In August 2022, the federal government said that the San Diego region became an epicenter of another drug, fentanyl. According to statistics provided by the United States Border Patrol and Customs and Border Protection, all of the fentanyl seized by law enforcement in the counties of San Diego and Imperial between October 2021 and June 2022 amounted to 60% of the fentanyl seized at any port of entry throughout the United States in the same period.[14]

Public corruption

In 1985, San Diego mayor Roger Hedgecock resigned from his position after a jury found him guilty of committing 13 felony charges for conspiring with several prominent supporters to funnel more than $360,000 in illegal contributions into his campaign and subsequent perjury.[15] In 2005, mayor Dick Murphy and several other officials resigned while there was an ongoing investigation into the city's pension fund.[16] Two members of the San Diego City Council, including deputy mayor Michael Zucchet, were also subjects in another federal investigation case.[17] A federal jury convicted then-acting mayor Zucchet and councilman Ralph Inzunza in July for accepting bribes from a strip club owner to promote the repeal of a "no touch" law.[18] In 2013, mayor Bob Filner resigned amid sexual harassment allegations.[19] Several months later, Filner pleaded guilty to one count of false imprisonment and two counts of battery.[20]

See also

References

  1. 1 2 Manolatos, Tony; Davis, Kristina (April 14, 2006). "County crows at glowing crime report". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Archived from the original on October 12, 2007. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  2. ↑ Levy, Francesca (October 11, 2010). "America's Safest Cities". Forbes. Archived from the original on July 5, 2019. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  3. ↑ Acosta, Amelia; Warner, Anmargaret (July 25, 2013). "The 20 Safest Cities In America". Business Insider. Archived from the original on October 3, 2017. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  4. ↑ Thorsby, Devon (June 5, 2019). "The 25 Safest Places to Live in the U.S. in 2019". U.S. News & World Report. Archived from the original on July 5, 2019. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  5. ↑ "FBI: San Diego safest big city in the United States last year in terms of murders". San Diego: CBS8. September 25, 2017. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  6. ↑ Winkley, Lyndsay; Schroeder, Lauryn (September 26, 2018). "San Diego boasted lowest violent crime rate of biggest cities last year". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Archived from the original on July 5, 2019. Retrieved July 5, 2019.
  7. ↑ "San Diego historical crime rates per 1,000 population" (PDF). City of San Diego. January 29, 2020. Retrieved September 11, 2020.
  8. ↑ "San Diego historical crime actuals" (PDF). City of San Diego. January 29, 2020. Retrieved September 11, 2020.
  9. 1 2 Burks, Megan (April 2, 2014). "The Scope of San Diego's Gang Problem". Voice of San Diego. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  10. ↑ Burke, Cynthia; Keaton, Sandy; Correia, Debbie (December 2013). "Gang Involvement Among San Diego County Arrestees in 2012" (PDF). San Diego Association of Governments. Archived from the original (PDF) on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  11. ↑ Warth, Gary (September 16, 2007). "1980s: Meth explodes in San Diego". The San Diego Union-Tribune. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  12. ↑ "California - Southern District Drug Threat Assessment Overview". National Drug Intelligence Center. December 2000. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  13. ↑ "California targeted by meth traffickers, cyber criminals". The San Diego Union-Tribune. March 20, 2014. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  14. ↑ "Feds say San Diego region 'epicenter' of fentanyl trafficking into U.S." KFMB-TV. San Diego: City News Service. August 11, 2022. Archived from the original on August 24, 2022. Retrieved March 21, 2023.
  15. ↑ Horstman, Barry M (December 6, 1987). "Man About Town: San Diego's Ex-Mayor Roger Hedgecock Hasn't Let His Felony Conviction Get Him Down. But This Week, the Past May Catch Up With Him". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  16. ↑ Strumpf, Daniel (June 15, 2005). "San Diego's pension scandal for dummies". San Diego CityBeat. Archived from the original on February 19, 2009. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  17. ↑ Brand, Madeleine (May 2, 2005). "San Diego Mayor Resigns Amid Finance Scandal". NPR. Archived from the original on July 6, 2019. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  18. ↑ "San Diego acting mayor convicted of corruption". NBC News. San Diego: Associated Press. July 18, 2005. Retrieved July 6, 2019.
  19. ↑ Medina, Jennifer (August 23, 2013). "Denying Accusations of Sexual Harassment, the Mayor of San Diego Resigns". The New York Times. San Diego. Archived from the original on July 19, 2019. Retrieved July 19, 2019.
  20. ↑ Camia, Catalina; Bacon, John (October 15, 2013). "Ex-San Diego mayor Filner pleads guilty to 3 charges". USA Today. Archived from the original on April 19, 2019. Retrieved July 19, 2019.
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