Hatfield Peverel is about as safe as the area around it, slightly worse on paper. Its crime rate is a little above the district average. Overall, the mix of crimes looks much like the country's. One category is higher than usual, but the numbers behind it are small. For an ordinary day in the village, this is a middling result.
Essex Police recorded 308 crimes in Hatfield Peverel in the year to May 2026, a published rate of about 72 per 1,000 residents. That is roughly 13% above the average for the Braintree district. The rate is published from small statistical areas, and with only a few hundred incidents a year, a handful either way can change it.
For comparison, the Braintree district as a whole recorded about 64 crimes per 1,000 residents over the same year. So Hatfield Peverel's rate is slightly above the district's, but it is not an outlier.
Averaged across its small statistical areas, Hatfield Peverel has about 2,330 people per square kilometre. Unemployment was about 2% at the last census, and about 2% of households were overcrowded. It is a village of houses with gardens, a cricket club dating from 1885, a farm shop and a medieval priory that is now a scheduled monument.
Violence and sexual offences make up 36% of recorded crime here, against 35% nationally. The category covers a wide range, including common assault where nobody was injured, and it is the largest category almost everywhere. Anti-social behaviour is 21% of the local total, against 16% nationally. Criminal damage and arson (7%), other theft (7%) and vehicle crime (5%) are close to the national shares. Robbery is the one that stands out: about 9% of recorded crime here, against about 1% nationally. The total is small enough that a few incidents can move any of these shares by several points, so the robbery figure needs watching for another year before it says anything settled about the village. The police's street-level crime map shows roughly where incidents were recorded, so you can check the roads around a house you are considering.
After a crime is reported, Essex Police charges a suspect in about 11% of cases, against about 12% nationally. That is 28th out of 42 forces in England and Wales. About 37% of its cases are closed without a suspect being identified. These are figures for the whole Essex Police force area. They say how often an offender is caught after a crime, not how often crime happens in Hatfield Peverel.
Hatfield Peverel is about as safe as the rest of the district, with a slightly higher rate. Nothing in its numbers is alarming. The robbery figure is the only one to watch, and it rests on a small number of crimes.