Crime stats: Murder rate down but more than 50 000 sexual offences in last 12 months

Minster of Police Senzo Mchunu released the crime statistics for the second quarter of the 2024/25 financial year.

The presentation painted a positive picture, with all of the country’s serious crimes showing quarter-on-quarter decrease.

However, police still recorded a total of 160 935 serious crimes.

Murder rate down

Mchunu listed the core crimes as murder, attempted murder, assault with intent to do grievous bodily harm (GBH) and rape.

These violent crimes are receiving priority treatment by police, which has shown a 5.8% decrease in murder and a 2.5% decrease in sexual offences

However, attempted murder was up by 2.2% and assault GBH was up by 1% from the same quarter last year.

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Other successes were the decrease in common robbery and aggravated robbery, down 6.2% and 8.8%, respectively.

Overall, 17 crime categories showed a decrease of some kind, while Operation Shanela led to 262 396 arrests from 7 549 high density operations.

The public order police unit secured 2 756 arrests and confiscated R22 million in counterfeit goods, while border police seized R498 million worth of drugs.

“While we have made significant strides, the path has not been easy and we know there is still work to be done,” said Mchunu.

“South Africa needs to guard against what I refer to as established criminals and criminal organisations who make criminality a norm.”

Sexual offences high

Lecturer and independent crime consultant Johan Burger said while the quarterly stats are encouraging, they are not that useful to identify crime trends.

Police registered 6 545 murders in the last quarter, down from 6 954 from the same quarter last year.

10 191 rapes were reported between October 2023 and September 2024, down from 10 516 from the same period 12 months prior.

“My assessment is that is encouraging to see a minor difference quarter by quarter but we need to look at the wider picture, including seasonal changes,” Burger told The Citizen.

In the past four quarterly stats released, South Africa registered 27 016 murders and 53 061 sexual offences.

Compared to the same four quarters 12 months earlier, they registered 27 077 murder and 53 546 sexual offences.

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