Federal Defendants, Australia

The introduction of COVID-19 related restrictions in March 2020 affected the volume of defendants finalised in Australian courts. Court operations were affected by the temporary closures in courts across all jurisdictions and the deferral of some cases. The restrictions also coincided with a fall in the number of offenders proceeded against by police for the same crime period which likely reduced the number of court cases. This should be considered when interpreting the federal defendants data for the 2019–20 reference period, and when comparing to earlier years.

This release presents data related to defendants charged with an offence against Commonwealth legislation, who were finalised within an Australian criminal court in 2019–20. The data is a subset of the Criminal Courts, Australia collection.

The counting unit is a finalised defendant (see Glossary in Methodology). Unless otherwise specified, the numbers below exclude defendants finalised by transfer between court levels. 

There were 7,627 federal defendants finalised in 2019–20, a decrease of 19% (1,806) from the previous year.

This represents around 2% of total defendants finalised (469,208) in Australia’s state and territory criminal courts over the same period, as reported in Criminal Courts, Australia, 2019–20.

The proportion of federal defendants by sex remained relatively stable in 2019–20.

Summary characteristics relating to federal defendants finalised are presented below.

The most common principal federal offence in 2019–20 was harassment and threatening behaviour (46%, 3,461 defendants). The number of defendants with this offence has increased since 2010–11. 

During 2019–20, most defendants with this principal federal offence were classified to the federal offence group 'communications' (see Methodology for further detail), indicating that the harassment and/or threatening behaviour occurred via carriage services (for example mobile phone or internet).

Of the 5,551 federal defendants with a guilty outcome in 2019–20:

• The most common principal sentence was a monetary order (37% or 2,049 federal defendants)
• Most monetary orders involved a fine (1,901 defendants)
• A further 32% (1,762) were sentenced to other non-custodial orders such as a good behaviour bond, licence disqualification or forfeiture of property
• 903 (16%) were sentenced to custody in a correctional institution.

Defendants with a guilty outcome for the following principal offences had the greatest proportions sentenced to a monetary order:

• Commercial, industry or financial regulations (88% or 227)
• Offences against government operations (77% or 491).

Import or export illicit drugs offences had the greatest proportion of defendants sentenced to custody in a correctional institution (87% or 158).

There was a decrease in the number of federal defendants finalised in all states and territories during 2019–20 except for the Northern Territory, which increased by 24% (20 defendants).

The largest numerical decreases occurred in:

• Victoria (down 728 or 24%)
• Queensland (down 558 or 30%)
• The Australian Capital Territory (down 205 or 47%).

The decrease in Victoria and the Australian Capital Territory was mostly due to a reduction in finalisations for federal traffic and vehicle regulatory offences (specifically parking offences). In Queensland, the largest decreases occurred for offences against government operations (down 138 or 37%) and harassment and threatening behaviour (down 137 or 25%).

A monetary order was the most common principal federal sentence across most states and territories, ranging from 72% in Western Australia (271) to 38% in Victoria (596).

This release previously used catalogue number 4515.0.