Violent crimes down - Selebi
2004-09-20 16:38
Pretoria - Most violent crimes, except for aggravated robbery, decreased in the past two financial years, said national police commissioner Jackie Selebi on Monday.
Murder dropped by 9.9%, attempted murder by 17.8%, serious assault by 4.3%, common assault by 2.6% and common robbery by 7.8%, he told reporters in Pretoria.
While aggravated robbery showed an increase of 3.2% in the 2003/'04 financial year compared to the previous one, this category experienced an 11.1% drop in the first three months of 2004, Selebi said.
He pointed out that not all kinds of aggravated robbery increased in the period under review.
The hijacking of cars dropped by 8%, hijacking of trucks by 10.5%, cash-in-transit robberies by 49.7%, and bank robberies by 58.3%.
Street robberies and muggings were largely to blame for the rise in aggravated robbery.
"We will need to do more in... crime prevention to ensure that we decrease even this category," said the commissioner.
Regarding a decrease of 1.4% in reported rape cases, Selebi said the figure was too marginal to indicate a success. More had to be done to address this category of crime.
Unveiling the SA Police Service's annual report, Selebi said property-related crimes were also on the decrease.
Housebreaking at business premises dropped by 14.4%, theft of motor vehicles and theft out of motor vehicles by 14%, stock theft by 13.4%, residential housebreaking by 8.3%, car theft by 7.3%, and other theft by 4.2%.
On the rise, however, were drug-related crimes - up by 14.2%, the illegal possession of firearms (4.2%), shoplifting (2.1%) and driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs (10.1%).
Increases in crimes related to drugs, illegal firearm possession and driving under the influence should be seen as a positive development, as it indicated police had been able to arrest more culprits, Selebi said.
The statistics overall, he said, show that police achieved "significant successes towards a reduction of crime, particularly in the categories of contact crimes and property-related crimes".
- SAPA