Why is Freeland, Washington so murdery?

Freeland is a small town on Whidbey Island, in Island County, Washington, with a population of about 1,966. It accounts for one of the show's five murders in the area: episode 624 covers a single killing in the town itself, on 26 December 2003, within a family the episode follows from a 1995 marriage and two children. That is the whole of Freeland's local count, which puts it at 272 overall and third in Washington.

The other four come from episode 113, set in Clearview, 23 miles away and about half an hour north of Seattle, where the cases are dated 1974 and 1982. That one episode, with four victims, carries most of the tally, so the town's rank rests on a single bad stretch in a commuter belt rather than a long local habit.

Worth saying plainly: this counts the show's cases, not crime statistics. The show picks the towns, and a place with one Christmas killing can outrank a city. Freeland's own contribution is a single episode, a modest claim to infamy for a town founded on the promise of free land.