Press Statement

Preasráiteas

21 December 2021

Go to release: Recorded Crime Q3 2021

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (21 December 2021) published the latest Recorded Crime statistics, which cover the period to the end of September 2021.

Commenting on the release, Sam Scriven, Statistician, said: “Recorded Crime statistics for the year ending in September 2021 show a continued rise in the number of fraud incidents recorded on An Garda Síochána (AGS)’s PULSE database. Just over 13,500 frauds were recorded in the 12-month period compared to just under 8,000 in the previous year, an increase of 72%. The increase is largely driven by unauthorised transactions and attempts to obtain personal or banking information online or by phone.

There were 15 fewer incidents of murder or manslaughter in the 12 months to September than in the previous year, but there was an increase of 10% in the number of crimes classified as sexual offences. The number of crimes recorded in most other crime incident type categories fell compared to the previous year, for example in burglary (down by 36%), theft (down by 20%) and robbery (down by 18%). Users should note when considering crime trends the varying COVID-19 restrictions in place for much of 2020 and 2021 and the likely impact of such restrictions on levels of crime.

A total of 516 offences were recorded on PULSE for breaches of COVID-19 regulations in Q3 2021. This figure was significantly lower than in previous quarters, reflecting the relatively low level of COVID-19 restrictions compared to earlier quarters.

On the issue of cancelled 999 calls, Sam Scriven, Statistician, said: “An internal AGS investigation into the inappropriate cancellation of calls on its Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) system is ongoing. The premature or improper cancellation of calls on the CAD system may mean that records relating to crimes, which were reported to AGS, were not created on the PULSE system, and are therefore not counted in Recorded Crime statistics. The CSO is awaiting clarification on the full impact of the issue from AGS, including the time periods involved (how far back this issue goes), the crime types impacted, and crucially, the estimated numbers of crimes which were not recorded on PULSE due to inappropriate cancellation of CAD calls, before it can determine the impact on Recorded Crime statistics.”

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