Meru, Lamu, Kirinyaga, Murang'a and Embu top the list of counties with the highest crime rates, police records show. Data from the National Police Service (NPS) covering the year ended December 2021 shows the crime index in Meru was at 326, making it the county with the most crime incidents per 100,000 people.

The report, which lists Kwale (104), Kakamega (107) and West Pokot (108) as the counties with the lowest crime rates, shows that only 18 counties have a score below the national average of 170 crimes per 100,000 people.

NPS explains that it calculates the crime index by dividing the number of reported crimes in a particular county by the total population in the same area and then multiplying this by 100,000. For example, in the year 2021, there were 81,272 crimes in Kenya and the population is 47,564,296. This equates to a crime rate of 170 per 100,000 people," says NPS in the report.