Why is Arlington Heights, Illinois so murdery?

Arlington Heights is a Chicago suburb about forty minutes out, and the 25 mile circle around it is crowded: 25 murders across nine towns, three of them in the town itself. That makes it fifth overall and third in Illinois, with cases from six miles away to twenty-four. It is commuter belt country, one suburb after another.

The cases run from 1966 to 2007, so this is not one bad decade but four, and the show keeps coming back. Most bring three victims; episode 184 brings eight, so a single case carries close to a third of the count while the rest add up three at a time. Episode 460, the town's own case, opens with Frontier Days before turning to a family.

This counts the show's cases, not the town's crime rate. James and Jimmie pick where to go, and a suburb with a festival and a story gets picked. Arlington Heights ranks here because the map around it is thick with towns the show has already visited, which says more about the booking than about the place.