In 2024/25 the crime rate in Scotland was *** crimes per 10,000 people, one of the lowest crime rates recorded in this time period. After peaking at ***** in 2004/05, the crime rate in Scotland has fallen significantly, reaching a low in the 2021/22 reporting year.

Glasgow City's crime rate of *** crimes per 10,000 people was the highest of any region of Scotland in 2024/25. The rate for the whole of Scotland was *** per 10,000 people, which appears to be driven by low crime in places such as the Shetland Islands, with almost all Scottish cities reporting higher than average crime rates. In Dundee, the crime rate was *** crimes per 10,000 people, while in the Scottish capital, Edinburgh, the crime rate was *** per 10,000 population. Comparisons with the rest of the UK When compared with the rest of the United Kingdom, Scotland has experienced a noticeable decline in its overall crime rate. In 2008/09 for example, Scotland's crime rate was higher than that of England and Wales, as well as Northern Ireland, the other two jurisdictions in the UK. In 2022/23, however, Scotland's crime rate was the lowest in the UK, with the crime rate in England and Wales rising noticeably during the same period. Scotland's homicide rate has also fallen, from being the highest in the UK in 2002/03, to the lowest in 2022/23. What types of crime increased in recent years? The overall number of crimes recorded by the Scottish police since the mid 2010s has remained broadly stable, with ******* offences reported in 2024/25. Specific types of crime have, however, increased in recent times. In 2024/25, for example, there were ****** sexual crimes reported by the police, compared with ***** ten years earlier. As in the rest of the UK, shoplifting has increased rapidly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching a peak of ****** offences in the 2024/25 reporting year.

In 2024/25, there were 71,170 non-sexual violent crimes recorded by the police in Scotland. The number of violent crimes in Scotland has generally fallen throughout this period, from a peak of 92,266 in 2002/03 to a low of 61,913 in 2020/21.

There were 299,111 crimes recorded by the police in Scotland in 2024/25, a similar figure to the previous year, when there were 299,790 crimes reported. During this time period, there is a clear trend of falling crime, with 2004/05 having the highest number of crimes and 2021/22 the fewest.

In the 2024/25 reporting year, there were 52,406 crimes recorded in Glasgow City, the most of any local authority in Scotland. The Shetland Islands, by comparison, had just 414 crimes recorded in the same period.

In 2024/25, there were 26,617 crimes against public justice recorded by the police in Scotland, the highest figure for this type of crime since 2011/12, when there were 26,635 crimes of this type recorded.

Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, NC was 342.00000 Known Incidents in January of 2021, according to the United States Federal Reserve. Historically, Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, NC reached a record high of 809.00000 in January of 2008 and a record low of 57.00000 in January of 2016. Trading Economics provides the current actual value, an historical data chart and related indicators for Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, NC - last updated from the United States Federal Reserve on November of 2025.

Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, MO was 22.00000 Known Incidents in January of 2018, according to the United States Federal Reserve. Historically, Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, MO reached a record high of 58.00000 in January of 2012 and a record low of 22.00000 in January of 2015. Trading Economics provides the current actual value, an historical data chart and related indicators for Combined Violent and Property Crime Offenses Known to Law Enforcement in Scotland County, MO - last updated from the United States Federal Reserve on November of 2025.

Since 2014, Eurostat and the UNODC have launched a joint annual data collection on crime and criminal justice statistics, using the UN crime trends questionnaire and complementary Eurostat requests

for specific areas of interest to the European Commission. The data and metadata are collected from National Statistical Institutes or other relevant authorities (mainly police and justice departments) in each EU Member State, EFTA country and EU potential members. On the Eurostat website, data are available for 41 jurisdictions since 2008 until 2018 data and for 38 jurisdictions since 2019 data (EU-27, Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Albania, Serbia, Turkey, Kosovo(1)), having drop the data for the United Kingdom separately owing to three separate jurisdictions England and Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland.

This joint data collection and other data collections carried out by Eurostat allows to gather information on:

• police-recorded offences by type of crime
• police-recorded offences by NUTS3 region
• intentional homicide and sexual violence victims and perpetrators (suspected, prosecuted, convicted) by sex
• intentional homicide victims by age, sex, and relationship to the offender
• intentional homicide victims and offences in largest cities
• offenders by justice legal status (suspected, prosecuted, convicted), age, sex, and citizenship
• persons brought before criminal courts by legal status (convicted persons/acquitted)
• personnel by institution (police, courts, and prisons) by sex
• legal cases in first instance courts by type and stage
• prisoners by age, sex, citizenship, and status of the trial process
• prison capacity and occupancy
• people involved in human trafficking by legal status (victims, suspected and convicted traffickers) and victims of human trafficking by all forms of exploitation and citizenship

Where available, data are broken down by sex, age groups (adults/juveniles), country of citizenship (foreigners or nationals) and other relevant variables. National data are available and for intentional homicide offences, city level data (largest cities) are available for some countries. Regional data at NUTS3 level are also available for some police-recorded offences.

Some historical series are available:

• Number of police-recorded crimes by type (intentional homicide, violence, robbery, home burglary, car thefts, and drug crimes) for the period 1993 – 2007
• Number of police-recorded homicide in cities for the period 1993 – 2007
• Number of police officers for the period 1993 – 2007
• Prison population for the period 1993 – 2007

Total number of police-recorded crimes for the period 1950 – 2000

(1) under United Nations Security Council Resolution 1244/99

The crime rate in the United Kingdom was highest in England and Wales in 2024/25, at **** crimes per 1,000 people, compared with Scotland, which had **** crimes per 1,000 population, and Northern Ireland, at **** crimes per 1,000 people in 2023/24. During this time period, the crime rate of England and Wales has usually been the highest in the UK, while Scotland's crime rate has declined the most, falling from **** crimes per 1,000 people in 2002/03, to just **** by 2021/22. Overall crime on the rise In 2024/25, there were approximately **** million crimes recorded by the police in England and Wales. Although this was a slight decline on the previous two years, it was still far higher than during the mid-2010s. While crime declined quite significantly between 2002/03 and 2013/14, this trend went into reverse in subsequent years. While there are no easy explanations for the recent uptick in crime, it is possible that reduced government spending on the police service was at least partly to blame. In 2009/10, for example, government spending on the police stood at around **** billion pounds, with this cut to *****billion in 2013/14. One of the most visible consequences of these cuts was a sharp reduction in the number of police officers in the UK. Between 2010 and 2017, the number of officers fell by 20,000, although the number of officers returned to pre-austerity levels by the 2020s. A creaking justice system During the period of austerity, the Ministry of Justice as a whole saw its budget sharply decline, from *** billion pounds in 2009/10 to just **** billion by 2015/16. Although there has been a reversal of the cuts to budgets and personnel in the justice system, the COVID-19 pandemic hit the depleted service hard in 2020. A backlog of cases grew rapidly, putting a strain on the ability of the justice system to process cases quickly. In 2022, for example, it took on average *** days for a crown court case to go from offence to conclusion, compared with *** days in 2018. There is also the issue of overcrowding in prisons, with the number of prisoners in England and Wales dangerously close to operational capacity in recent years.

This horizontal bar chart displays news by source using the aggregation count. The data is filtered where the keywords includes Crime-Scotland-Glasgow-History.

In 2024/25, there were ***** hate crime charges reported to the prosecution service in Scotland, compared with ***** in the previous year.

There were 11,249 handling offensive weapon crimes recorded by the police in Scotland in 2024/25, a peak for this type of crime during the provided time period.

Between 2019/20 and 2023/24 there have been 47 homicide cases in the Glasgow City local authority area of Scotland, the most of any Scottish local authority in that time period. The City of Edinburgh had the second-highest number of homicides, at 24, while there were zero homicides in the Outer Hebrides.

Data Updated: 22/11/2024 This dataset contains counts of confirmed UK raptor persecution incidents per 10km square (from 2007 to 2023). It is derived from data collated by the RSPB Investigations Team, a specialist unit set up to assist the statutory agencies with the investigation and prosecution of crimes against wild birds. These data are the most complete centralised set of known confirmed raptor persecution incident data for the UK, and has been recorded consistently for several decades. Only the highest evidentially weighted incidents – those classified as ‘confirmed,’ are included here.‘Confirmed’ incidents are those were circumstances indicate that an illegal act has taken place. These incidents are typically substantiated by evidence such as post-mortem or toxicological analysis, or reliable eyewitness evidence. These figures represent only those incidents known to RSPB: many remain undetected and unreported, particularly those that occur in remote areas. Population studies and scientific reports therefore provide essential bigger picture information on the conservation impact of persecution for a number of raptor species.Toxicology results from the government’s Wildlife Incident Investigation Scheme (WIIS) form the primary source of raptor poisoning data included in these data. In isolated cases toxicology results may be obtained by other routes. The RSPB is the only organisation to present pesticide analysis data in a standardised format to reflect actual raptor persecution incidents.In addition to information received from members of the public, the RSPB would like to acknowledge and thank the following organisations who have contributed information contained in this dataset: - The Agri-Food and Biosciences Institute (AFB NI)- Chemicals Regulations Directorate (CRD)- Food and Environment Research Agency (Fera)- National Wildlife Crime Unit (NWCU)- Predatory Bird Monitoring Scheme (PBMS)- Raptor Study Group workers- The Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA)- Ryedale Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre- Science and Advice for Scottish Agriculture (SASA)- Scottish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SSPCA)- Scottish Agricultural College/ Scotland’s Rural College (SAC/SRUC)- Scottish Government Rural Payments and Inspection Directorate (SGRPID)- Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH)- All UK police forces- UK veterinary practices- Welsh Government- The Zoological Society of London (ZSL)This is a un-editable, public 'view' version of the data that is used in the Raptor Persecution Map Hub apps.

In 2024/25, there were ****** drug offences recorded by the police in Scotland. During this time period, the number of drug offences in Scotland has fluctuated, peaking in 2005/06 at ****** and falling to its lowest figure in the most recent year.

There were ****** sexual crimes in Scotland in 2024/25, compared with ****** in the previous reporting year. Since 2008/09, sexual offences have increased substantially in Scotland, mirroring similar developments in England and Wales.