I will wholeheartedly second the advice to talk to the potential new neighbors, that has bailed me out twice. One was in a brand-new development and we were almost ready to sign a contract. On impulse, I said "Let's take a walk around and talk to some of the new owners and see what they think". Boy, did we get an earful! It turned out that the builder had apparently never seen a carpenter's square or had the foggiest what caulking was for, and was very reluctant to fix anything. We just about ran from that place. On another we found out about a "problem neighbor". At the moment I forget exactly what the issue was (long time ago) but I knew we didn't want to live near it.
On the crime level issue, in addition to the online resources I'd suggest going by the local police station and see if you can talk to a few of the officers or desk clerks. They will know the gritty details about any neighborhood. There is a lot of stuff going on in most neighborhoods that don't make the statistics that a new home buyer will want to know about. In my case, before I bought a house and did that, I had to tell the officer where it was (buried in suburban sprawl). I knew that was a good sign, because it told me they never had to go there. I was not disappointed.
On the crime level issue, in addition to the online resources I'd suggest going by the local police station and see if you can talk to a few of the officers or desk clerks. They will know the gritty details about any neighborhood. There is a lot of stuff going on in most neighborhoods that don't make the statistics that a new home buyer will want to know about. In my case, before I bought a house and did that, I had to tell the officer where it was (buried in suburban sprawl). I knew that was a good sign, because it told me they never had to go there. I was not disappointed.