INTRODUCTION
This publication presents statistics about finalised defendants charged with federal offences, that are dealt with by the criminal jurisdiction of the Higher (Supreme and Intermediate), Magistrates' and Children's Courts of Australia, for the period 1 July 2008 to 30 June 2009, for all states and territories, except Tasmania. Data for Tasmania were not available for inclusion in this issue of the publication, therefore, complete national data are not yet available from this collection. Data for the contributing states and territories have been aggregated to provide a total for the tables presented, unless otherwise specified.
This chapter provides an introduction to the federal defendants collection. Chapter 2 presents data about finalised defendants with federal charges classified to the Australian Standard Offence Classification (ASOC). Chapter 3 presents data about federal offences heard in the criminal courts and classified to a non-standard group of offences providing an alternative view of the types of offences federal defendants have been charged with.