ABOUT THIS PUBLICATION

This publication presents nationally comparable statistics relating to the criminal jurisdictions of the Higher (Supreme and Intermediate), Magistrates' and Children's Courts across Australia for the period 1 July 2012 to 30 June 2013. Selected time series data are also included where available. The statistics describe the characteristics of defendants, including information on the offences, case outcomes and sentences associated with those defendants.

CHANGES IN THIS ISSUE

For this edition of the publication, a review was undertaken of the tables in consultation with data users and other stakeholders. The tables have been restructured, resulting in a greater focus both in the tables and text on national data for All Courts.

This issue also includes several additions to the published statistics:

• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander status data for the Higher Courts for South Australia. As a result, information about Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander defendants is now available for each court level in New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory.
• Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander status data for sentence length of defendants given custody in a correctional institution.
• Community service order sentence length data for Victoria and Western Australia. As a result, information is now available for community service order sentence length at the national level.
• Sentence length for partially suspended sentences for all jurisdictions.

In addition, data on sentence length and fine amount have been incorporated into the main release of the Criminal Courts publication instead of as a subsequent supplementary release.

A number of revisions have been made to the 2010–11 and 2011–12 data (see Explanatory Notes paragraphs 110–115). As many of these revisions impact on sentence length of custody in a correctional institution, a supplementary time-series table (Table 60) has been included in the publication for this issue only.

DATA CONSISTENCY

The statistics in this publication are sourced from the national Criminal Courts collection conducted by ABS and have been compiled according to national standards in order to maximise consistency between the states and territories. The Explanatory Notes, Appendices and Glossary provide detailed information on the data sources, counting rules, terminology, classifications and other technical aspects associated with these statistics.

ROUNDING

Discrepancies may occur between sums of component items and totals across tables and within some summary tables due to rounding and randomisation.

INFORMATION ON ABS CRIME AND JUSTICE STATISTICS

More information about ABS publications relating to crime and justice statistics, and activities in the field of crime and justice statistics is available from the Crime and Justice theme page on the ABS website.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The ABS acknowledges the valuable contribution of the Board of Management of the National Criminal Courts Statistics Unit, the National Criminal Courts Statistics Advisory Group, the Court Practitioners' Group and the staff of the various agencies that provide the data presented in this publication.

INQUIRIES

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