Open gang warfare and brazen shootings in Auckland saw recorded gun crimes spike during a single month in the Super City with an average of more than three per day. Video / NZ Herald
Reported crime victimisation rates hit a record high of more than 30,000 in May, the same month Auckland recorded an average of more than three shootings a day.
But a senior police officer says the overall level of crime has not risen and the record victimisation stats reflect increased reportingof offences and better intelligence gathering.
A Herald on Sunday analysis of police data has revealed monthly victimisations hit 30,098 in May this year, compared to 23,559 in May 2019 and 22,435 in May 2018. In July 2014, the earliest month for which victimisation data is available, the figure was 20,544.
Reported crime plunged during the Covid lockdowns, bottoming out at 12,868 in the depths of the first level 4 lockdown.
"Victimisation" in police parlance means reported crime for which there is a direct victim, so illicit drug offences are not included.
The victimisation numbers are generally regarded as not a good gauge of actual overall crime, largely because most offences go unreported.
The Ministry of Justice's New Zealand Crime and Victims Survey (NZCVS), which has been conducted four times in recent years, canvassed 6244 people in 2021 and again found only 25 per cent of all crime is reported to police.
Results from the most recent survey found 29 per cent of adults were victims of crime in the past 12 months, about the same number as the survey's first cycle in 2018.
The total number of offences against New Zealand adults, most recently 1.74 million, also remained stable, according to the survey.
Police deployment and road policing assistant commissioner Bruce O'Brien said population growth from 4.5 million in 2014 to 5.1 million today was part of the reason for the rise in victimisations.
However, the population increase of 13 per cent is far below the 50 per cent increase in victimisations recorded by police over the past seven years.
O'Brien said another part of the increase was down to the fact it was now easier to report crime.
In May 2019, police launched the 105 non-emergency crime reporting line and online portal, meaning people no longer had to go into the station to make a report.
The victimisation data for that year shows a steady increase after the introduction of 105 and before the Covid plunge.
In addition, the widely used Auror crime platform and app for retailers, allowing shops to share intelligence and report theft to police more easily, was likely to have dragged up victimisations, O'Brien said.
"So they're able to report crime that probably we wouldn't have seen reported," he said.
Changes to the Family Violence Act that came into force in July 2019 was another factor that was likely to be increasing victimisation numbers, he said.
The amendment introduced new offences, including a specific offence of strangulation or suffocation that now frequently appears on the list of charges against accused domestic abusers each day in district courts around the country.
The reported number of crime "victimisations" have reached a record high. Photo / Hayden Woodward
It also created a specific new offence for assaulting a person in a family relationship, which has become another commonly used charge.
"For us, that's a really good thing in the sense ... that people now have the confidence to call police to get the help that they need. Before things sort of spiral out of control."
O'Brien rejects any suggestion the increase in reported crime reflects a general rise in the level of overall offending.
"No, I don't think that at all," he said.
"A lot of this was invisible to us. So I think it's more a case of we're getting a better picture of what is going on."
O'Brien acknowledged certain offences were increasing, namely family violence, retail crime and car theft.
Instead of police focusing on the volume of crime, O'Brien explains they have in recent years been using the New Zealand Crime Harm Index.
The index is designed to allow police to target their limited resources to the greatest effect in reducing the level of harm, rather than a simple approach focused on the volume of reports.
"Depending on the crime type, you can see as high as 3 per cent of offenders can be responsible for up to about 40 per cent of all harm," O'Brien said.
Police call that cohort the "power few".
"So for us, we've really got to be focused on those high harm offenders, those repeat victims, because we know there's a lot of victims out there that have been victimised more than once.
As well as repeat victims, police were also using the data to home in on crime-ridden public places and retailers targeted repeatedly.
O'Brien said it was "a really good proxy to determine harm, rather than just volume, because I think volume can at times be a little bit misleading".
