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Violent Crime Trends in Covington, Oklahoma: A Small Town's Fluctuating Safety Landscape
CATEGORY
Crime
DATA
Violent Crime
Median Rent
Racial Distributions
Population
Loading Content...
Crime
Violent Crime
Median Rent
Racial Distributions
Population
Covington, Oklahoma, is a small community that has experienced fluctuating violent crime rates alongside population changes in recent years. From 2017 to 2022, the total number of violent crimes increased from 0 to 1, representing a 100% increase. During this same period, the population decreased from 927 to 701, a decline of 24.4%.
The murder rate in this city has remained consistently at zero from 2017 to 2022. With no reported murders, the murder rate per 1,000 people and the percentage of state crime for murder have both remained at 0% throughout this period. This stability in the absence of murders suggests a relatively safe environment in terms of homicides.
Rape incidents in the city were nonexistent from 2017 to 2021. However, in 2022, there was one reported rape case. This single incident resulted in a rape rate of 1.43 per 1,000 people in 2022, based on the population of 701. The percentage of state rape crimes attributed to the city jumped from 0% to 0.06% in 2022. While this increase is significant in percentage terms, it's important to note that it represents a single case in a small population.
Robbery rates in the city have remained at zero from 2017 to 2022. Similar to murder rates, this consistent absence of robberies indicates that the city has maintained a 0% contribution to the state's robbery statistics and a 0 per 1,000 people robbery rate throughout this period.
Aggravated assault trends show some fluctuation. The city reported no aggravated assaults in 2017, 2018, and 2020. However, there was one case each in 2019 and 2021, representing a rate of 1.06 and 1.37 per 1,000 people respectively, based on the populations of those years. The percentage of state aggravated assaults attributed to the city was 0.01% in both 2019 and 2021. Interestingly, in 2022, the number of aggravated assaults dropped back to zero.
Examining correlations, there appears to be a weak inverse relationship between population density and violent crime. As the population density decreased from 1,842 per square mile in 2017 to 1,393 in 2022, the number of violent crimes slightly increased. Additionally, there's a potential correlation between median rent and violent crime. As median rent increased from $653 in 2017 to $858 in 2022, there was a slight uptick in violent crime incidents.
Applying predictive models to forecast violent crime trends for the next seven years (until 2029, which we'll refer to as five years from now), we might expect the violent crime rate to remain low but potentially fluctuate between 0 and 1 incidents per year. Given the small population and the rarity of these events, even a single incident can cause significant percentage changes.
In summary, Covington has maintained a relatively low violent crime rate over the examined period. The most notable changes were the appearance of a single rape case in 2022 and the fluctuation in aggravated assaults. These findings suggest that while the city generally experiences very low levels of violent crime, isolated incidents can have a significant impact on crime statistics due to the small population size. The relationship between decreasing population density and slightly increasing violent crime rates, as well as the correlation with rising median rents, may warrant further attention from local policymakers.
