IS YOUTH CRIME VICTIMISATION AND OFFENDING INCREASING?
Young people and their experiences of victimisation: selected offences
Overall, there has been a significant decrease in estimated victimisation rates for physical assault and threatened assault between 2008-09 and 2009-10, as shown in the graph below. For the youth population, there was a significant decrease for youth aged 15-17 (8.5% to 5.6%) in physical assault and threatened assault (7.9% to 5.0%). For youth aged 18-24, there was a significant decrease for threatened assault (7.0% to 5.2%).
VICTIMS OF PHYSICAL ASSAULT, VICTIMISATION RATES(a), 2008-09 to 2009-10
Source: ABS Crime Victimisation, Australia, 2009-10 (cat. no. 4530.0).
VICTIMS OF THREATENED ASSAULT(a), VICTIMISATION RATES(b), 2008-09 to 2009-10
Source: ABS Crime Victimisation, Australia, 2009-10 (cat. no. 4530.0).
Estimated victimisation rates have also decreased between 2008-09 and 2009-10 for sexual assault. The sexual assault victimisation rate for those aged 18-24 decreased from 0.6% to 0.5% between 2008-09 and 2009-10. For those persons aged 25 and over, the sexual assault victimisation rate also decreased from 0.3% to 0.2%.
While the victimisation rates for these selected personal offences have decreased over time, the proportion of youth victims has remained relatively high. In 2008-09, 31.5% of victims of total assault (including physical and threatened assault) were aged between 15 and 24 years of age, and in 2009-10, 29.4% of victims of total assault were aged between 15 and 24 years of age.
Young people as criminal offenders: 2007-08 to 2009-10
Offender rates (Endnote 15) for persons aged 10 to 14 years and persons aged 15 to 19 years have increased each year since 2007-08. This trend is in contrast to the offender rates for adults that have decreased each year since 2007-08. For persons aged 20 to 24 years, offender rates were highest in 2008-09 (4,416 per 100,000 persons), and decreased slightly in 2009-10 (4,411 per 100,000 persons).
The Recorded Crime – Offenders data shows that offending rates begin to decline from the age of 15 onwards. For example, the rate of offending in 2009-10 for persons aged 15-19 was 5,840 per 100,000 persons. In contrast, for those aged 25 and over, the offending rate was 1,307 per 100,000 persons. This trend was observed consistently across available data (2007-08 to 2009-10).
OFFENDER RATE(a) BY AGE, 2007-08 to 2009-10
Source: ABS Recorded Crime–Offenders, 2009-10 (cat. no. 4519.0)
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