Crime rate in Minnesota dropping back to pre-pandemic levels

Paul Walsh, The Minnesota Star Tribune on Sep 11, 2026

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MINNEAPOLIS — All major categories of reported crime in Minnesota last year were down from the previous year, according to a yearly state tally, with the drop especially notable in the Twin Cities metro area.

The yearly summary of crime by the state Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA), as reported to the agency by local law enforcement, showed that while the drop in crime was most dramatic in the Twin Cities metro area, rates declined in the rest of the state as well.

The murder rate fell by nearly a quarter between 2024 and 2025, according to the report, and by more than a third compared to 2021. That was the first full year of the COVID pandemic, a period that saw a spike in violent crime nationwide.

After initially releasing its report Thursday, the BCA pulled it offline for a few hours after the Minnesota Star Tribune reported that it had not initially included the state’s two most prominent homicides in 2025.

Here are some highlights from the BCA report for 2025 vs. 2024:

By the numbers: In the seven counties of the Twin Cities metro (Anoka, Carver, Dakota, Hennepin, Ramsey, Scott and Washington counties), violent crime fell by 14%. The drop in the state’s other 80 counties was 9%.

Based on population, violent crime in Minnesota declined to 226 per 100,000, the lowest rate since 2019.

There was a 23% decline, from 172 to 132, in murders. And when comparing last year’s total to 2021, the drop is 35%.

The BCA’s initial news release Thursday morning and accompanying online report said last year’s murder total was 130. The agency hours later bumped that number up by two after the Minnesota Star Tribune notified the BCA that it failed to include the killings on June 14, 2025, of Melissa Hortman, the former Minnesota House Speaker Emerita and DFL leader, and her husband, Mark Hortman.

Brooklyn Park Police Cmdr. Matthew Rabe told the Minnesota Star Tribune that a “technical problem” within his department prevented the Hortmans’ killings from reaching the BCA.

Rabe said his department notified the BCA of the Hortmans’ death on June 18, 2025, then restricted access within the department because the BCA was the lead investigative agency. That restriction inadvertently led to the killings being removed from the city’s murder total for the year.

“Something somewhere is broken” with the department’s automated reporting system, Rabe said. “We clearly need to get this fixed.”

The Minnesota Star Tribune has asked the BCA why the absence of the Hortmans’ deaths was not noticed on its end. The agency has yet to reply, nor has it said why data for three other cities required correcting.

Other categories that showed declines included robbery at 27%, aggravated assault at 11%, rape at 1.9%, vehicle theft at 22.4%, carjackings at 31%, property theft at 9.7%, crimes of bias at 1.75%, and arson at 15%.

The backstory: These numbers are based on crimes reported to law enforcement. Many crimes go unreported, particularly sexual assault offenses.

Minnesota’s decline in crime tracks with national numbers released in August by the FBI. Down last year from 2024 in the U.S. were murder and nonnegligent manslaughter (18.1%), rape (7.6%), aggravated assault (7.2%) and robbery (18.5%).

The conversation: “We know that both domestic and sexual violence are largely under- and unreported for many reasons,” said Violence Free Minnesota spokeswoman Meggie Royer, “including fear of not being believed; fear of retaliation from the perpetrator; fear of legal consequences for the victim and/or the perpetrator; community stigma; systemic barriers such as systemic racism and sexism; and many more.”

Other findings stood out, including that the discharge of a gun by law enforcement during a use-of-force incident fell from 32 incidents in 2024 to 21 in 2025. Those incidents last year resulted in six deaths. There were serious injuries in 16 of those encounters.

Law enforcement officers were assaulted in 981 incidents in 2025. That’s down by 1.3% from the previous year.

The full report can be found on the BCA website.

—Jeff Day of the Minnesota Star Tribune contributed to this story.