The Crime Statistics Agency has released their annual state-wide crime data for 2021, which revealed an overall decrease in criminal activity compared to 2020.
With 477,999 criminal offences recorded in Victoria for the 2021 calendar year, the state saw a decrease of 12.8% or 70,087 offences from 2020.
This represents the lowest number of criminal offences committed in a calendar year in Victoria since 2014.
The overall victimisation rate also significantly decreased, with 14,500 fewer victims of crime than during 2020 and the lowest number of victims of crime since 2010.
Deputy Commissioner Regional Operations, Rick Nugent said while Covid was a factor in the reduction in crime, it is still an uplifting sign.
“While the highly unique environment in Victoria last year clearly contributed to the overall decrease in crime, it was incredibly positive to see a reduction in serious offences which impact the community such as home burglaries, robberies and car thefts,” he said.
“While each victim of crime is one person too many, we are pleased that last year we had the lowest number of victims in Victoria since 2010, with almost 14,500 fewer victims of crime than the year prior.
In 2021, burglaries/break and enters were at their lowest levels for a calendar year since the Law Enforcement Assistance Program was introduced in 1993, while robberies were at the lowest since 2014 (2,534, down from 2,893 in 2020). Last year, 21,277 Victorian homes were broken into. While the amount of time people spent confined to their homes last year and lockdowns limiting opportunities for would-be offenders to target people in public locations clearly had an impact, there were still 1,445 fewer residential burglaries than in 2020 when restrictions were in place for a longer period of time. By comparison, 37,063 Victorians had their homes broken into in 2016, almost 1,600 more than last year.
There were almost 14,000 fewer theft-related offences in 2021 than the year prior (143,688, down from 157,627) – the lowest since 2011. This included around 1,800 fewer cars stolen and around 3,350 fewer cars broken into than 2020. Increased guardianship of property can be linked to the overall decline, but there was still a lower level of offending in year two of the pandemic than the first.
For the first time since the pandemic began, there was a decline in family violence with over 1,000 fewer incidents reported year-on-year (91,144, down from 92,513). In addition to this, almost 1,400 fewer family violence orders were breached than the previous year (51,813, down from 53,208). While these trends are positive, they must also be treated with caution, as there is the potential for further reporting of historical incidents that occurred throughout the pandemic, as victims continue to come forward to police to report.
Drug-related offences experienced a significant reduction, with drug dealing/trafficking dropping by around 1,600 offences and drug use and possession reducing by around 8,600 offences. With pubs and clubs back at full capacity and events such as music festivals resuming, police anticipate drug-related offending will again rise in line with people obtaining and using illicit drugs more frequently.
While the overwhelming majority of offences decreased in 2021, non-family violence assaults increased by around 0.2% in 2021, with non-family violence common assaults increasing by 678 offences and non-family violence serious assaults rising by 402 offences. The number of non-family violence assaults in 2021 remained equivalent to pre-pandemic levels.
Large numbers of people enjoying being back at licensed venues and celebrating the end of a tough year, disappointingly took celebrations too far, getting involved in fights and injuring others who were simply trying to enjoy themselves.
Riot and affray also increased by 292 offences, which is partly due to the above incidents as well as protest activity throughout the pandemic. The increase in these offences is also the result of Victoria Police’s dedicated focus on disrupting and investigating gang-related activity under Operation Alliance.
Commissioner Nugent indicated that crime will likely rise as society returns to normal, but said the positive reductions and hard work of Victoria Police will help keep the crime rate down.
“While it is likely that overall crime will increase as the community returns to normality, the early signs are relatively positive. To date, we have not seen a rapid return across all crime categories, with police intelligence indicating overall offending still remains below pre-pandemic levels,” he said.
“It has also been encouraging that the number of first-time offenders across all crime categories has remained consistent with the previous two years. We are particularly pleased that first time youth offenders decreased 7.6% in the last year, contributing to a reduction of 35.8% over ten years.
“Every member of Victoria Police is working tirelessly to keep the crime rate as low as possible – whether it’s the police officers deployed to your local shopping strip to stop crime from occurring, the police vehicle patrolling your neighbourhood to keep car thieves at bay, or the detectives investigating, arresting and prosecuting offenders, we are doing everything possible to keep you safe.”
