POLICE PROCEEDINGS, SELECTED STATES AND TERRITORIES

OVERVIEW

This chapter presents statistics about police proceedings during the period 1 July 2016 to 30 June 2017 for all states and territories, except Western Australia (for further information refer to paragraph 69 of the Explanatory Notes). As a consequence, national data are not available for police proceedings.

A proceeding is a legal action initiated against an offender for an offence(s). In this publication, police proceedings represent a count for each separate occasion on which police initiate a legal action against an offender. Please note this is not a count of offences or a count of offenders. An offender can be proceeded against multiple times during the reference period, and so can appear multiple times in the police proceedings population. For more information about offenders refer to other chapters of this publication. For further information about the scope and counting methodology for the collection refer to paragraphs 3–15 of the Explanatory Notes.

In this collection, national statistical standards and counting rules have been applied to facilitate comparisons of states and territories. However, some legislative and processing differences remain. For differences in legislation, processes or policies between states and territories, refer to paragraphs 50–84 of the Explanatory Notes.


TOTAL POLICE PROCEEDINGS

Between 2015–16 and 2016–17 the number of proceedings in the seven states and territories for which these data are available increased by 2% (10,342 proceedings). (Tables 26–32)


COURT ACTIONS

In this collection, police initiated legal proceedings can be categorised as court actions or non-court actions (note these data are not available for the Northern Territory; see Explanatory Notes paragraph 79).

Between 2015–16 and 2016–17, the number of court actions decreased by 1% (1,777 proceedings) for the six states and territories for which method of proceeding data are available. The largest contributors to the decrease were:

• Queensland, down 2% or 3,413 proceedings. This occurred primarily for the principal offences of Illicit drug offences (down 8% or 2,872 proceedings); Offences against justice (down 6% or 1,516 proceedings); and Public order offences (down 8% or 1,487 proceedings).
• South Australia, down 9% or 2,986 proceedings. This occurred primarily for the principal offences of Public order offences (down 31% or 1,169 proceedings); Acts intended to cause injury (down 8% or 674 proceedings); and Theft (down 10% or 560 proceedings).

By contrast, Victorian court actions increased by 4% (3,275 proceedings), particularly for the principal offences of Offences against justice (up 12% or 1,030 proceedings) and Acts intended to cause injury (up 4% or 773 proceedings). (Tables 26–30 and 32)



NON–COURT ACTIONS

Between 2015–16 and 2016–17 the number of non-court actions increased by 5% (11,741 proceedings) for the six states and territories for which method of proceeding data are available.

There were increases in non-court actions for New South Wales (up 11% or 14,902 proceedings) and South Australia (up 8% or 2,526 proceedings). For both states the largest contributor to the increase was Fare evasion offences, which is not necessarily a police responsibility in other states and territories.

The highest decreases in non-court actions were for Victoria (down 9% or 3,404 proceedings) and Queensland (down 6% or 1,906 proceedings). (Tables 26–30 and 32)