These statistics are categorised as Under Reservation. This categorisation indicates that the quality of these statistics do not meet the standards required of official statistics published by the CSO.
For further information please refer to the Under Reservation FAQ page.
Crimes where a suspected offender has been identified and sanctioned may be recorded as detected. Valid sanctions include charge or summons, formal and informal cautions, and fixed penalties for certain offences. A crime may have more than one suspected offender and they may be sanctioned by different means.
There are some limited circumstances where a detection is allowed but a suspected offender is not sanctioned, e.g. the offender dies before they can be prosecuted, or the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) decides that prosecution is not in the public interest. These circumstances are outlined in the An Garda Síochána Crime Counting Rules document, and these exceptions must be centrally validated by GISC (Garda Information Services Centre) since the introduction of the PULSE 7.3 upgrade. As the PULSE upgrade happened in February 2018, the majority of the incidents in the column Decision not to Sanction/Sanction Type not Recorded relate to January and February incidents.
37% of all cautions were issued to Group 13 (Public order and other social code offences) and 35% to Group 8 (Theft and related offences). For other crime types, the use of a charge or summons is more likely to be the sanction applied.
Table 6.1 shows the number of persons detected for crimes reported in 2018 and the method of sanction used.
Charge or Summons | Adult Caution | Juvenile Caution | Caution (other) | Fixed Charge Notice / Fixed Penalty Notice | Decision not to Sanction / Sanction Type not Recorded | |
01 Homicide Offences | 97 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
02 Sexual Offences | 74 | 0 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 15 |
03 Attempts/Threats to Murder, assaults, harassments and related offences | 73 | 9 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 7 |
06 Robbery, Extortion and Hijacking Offences | 93 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
07 Burglary and Related Offences | 87 | 0 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 3 |
08 Theft and Related Offences | 76 | 9 | 13 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
10 Controlled Drug Offences | 92 | 0 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
12 Damage to Property and to the Environment | 71 | 7 | 16 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
13 Public Order and other Social Code Offences | 68 | 7 | 9 | 4 | 10 | 1 |
Go to next chapter: Fixed Charge Notice and Fixed Penalty Notice Sanctions
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