The number of rapes in Arlington County increased 23 percent in 2007, police said Tuesday.
The statistic comes months after Arlington police urged women to beware of a spate of less serious sexual assaults occurring near the county’s Metro stations.
There were 27 reported incidences of rape in Arlington last year, up from 22 the year before, according to county records.
Police said few of the cases involved strangers and most involved people who were acquainted with each other.
“Even though it’s a 23 percent increase, it’s really only an increase of raw numbers of five,” Deputy Police Chief Dan Murray said, adding the rate is still low for a county with a population of about 200,000.
In the fall, eight women reported being inappropriately groped in separate incidents in or around the Courthouse, Rosslyn and Ballston Metrorail stations.
“Quite frankly, for the series we had last year, we didn’t even have one suspect description,” said Special Victims Unit Lt. Brett Butler. “It appeared to be several different people.”
Butler said the incidents died down at the end of the year after the department saturated the Metro corridor with patrol and undercover officers and enlisted extra help from Metro Transit Police.
Another woman was attacked near the Ballston Metro station in January, according to police records.
A man grabbed her and attempted to remove her clothing before she escaped.
Another woman was inappropriately grabbed while walking in the Courthouse area in February.
Two women have reported being assaulted or groped on bike trails this month.
A 37-year-old woman was pulled into the bushes and sexually assaulted when she was walking on the bike trail behind Barcroft Park, and another woman was touched inappropriately by a man on a bicycle when she was running on the Washington & Old Dominion Trail.
Police said this type of crime tends to increase during the warmer months and that the department will place more officers around trail areas and coordinate with the county’s park rangers.
“We’re starting to reach out to folks again andsay it’s getting to be that time of year again,” Butler said.
