NZ Police spin domestic violence crime stats
Recorded crime in New Zealand dropped to its lowest level for 15 years in 2011. Latest crime statistics show a 4.8% decrease in recorded offences from the previous calendar year, continuing a steady decline in recorded crime. There were 20,289 fewer offences recorded in 2011 than during the previous calendar year, with 406,056 offences recorded.
Oh our crime rates have dropped have they? Really? Well perhaps someone should be telling this to the NZers getting beaten up at home every year because the NZ Police seem to have taken liberties with those facing domestic violence to spin the 'recorded' crime stats.
In 2009 the number of Police callouts to domestic violence was 78, 693.
In 2010 it increased to 84, 673 callouts.
And in 2011 the number of callouts to domestic violence was 86, 710. No decreases here are there, but wait, here comes the NZ police fairy dust. What has been changed is the way the NZ Police 'record' crime so that it looks like it's falling. In 2010 Police arrested 42, 108 of those 84, 673 call outs, in 2011 they only arrested 39, 983 of the increased call outs of 86, 710.
Between 2009-2011 there have been 12, 678 less arrests which amounts to an eye watering decrease of 31.7%
What's happening here is that the Police, to lower crime rates and lesson the budget costs, are lifting the threshold of violence acceptable before the Police will intervene. How on earth they've managed to get away with spinning these stats while in-acting a cost cutting strategy that sees domestic violence victims have to cope with higher levels of violence before the Police will arrest surprises even someone as jaded towards the Police as I am.
The Police are going out to more domestic violence call outs than ever before, yet are significantly arresting 31.7% less so the stats look great while lowering the overall costs.
The Police officer is making a decision all on their own if the violence is beneath a threshold that they determine, shouldn't that be the responsibility of a Court?
How can our most vulnerable being threatened in their own homes be left with such an outcome and no one else in the media challenge it? One of the biggest changes in this spin is that domestic violence specific stats are now no longer even being recorded meaning we will be the only country in the OECD who doesn't specifically record domestic violence stats. In a CEDAW report (Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women), the committee advised that NZ needed better reporting of NZ family violence yet this new direction actually does all it can to hide the extent of domestic violence.
As the anti-domestic TV advert says, 'It's not okay'. Well it sure as hell isn't okay to hide family violence either, and that's what the Police have done here with their new crime stat spinning tactics.
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posted by Bomber @ 6:59 am
4 comments
4 Comments:
It could be possible that with all the advertising about domestic violence that people are ringing police up at much earlier signs of domestic dispute before it gets (really) violent.
While I agree that all of these incidents should be recorded, the lack of arrest doesn't necessarily mean that the police just can't be bothered or something. In many cases women get the police (or other people) involved purely to stop the abuse, not to make an arrest. In many countries where mandatory arrest policies have been implimented, many women have refused to get the police involved because they do not want their partner locked up (particularly because this can cause retributive violence). I understand the point you're making, but there may be a bit more to it, like police listening to what the women want more often.
It may not be the cougars or the better work stories or the takin' the piss fuzz association spokesman or the faster you go the bigger the mess or the bumbling bureaucracies or the dismal lack of respect humans hold towards one another. Distortion of results are the mainstream of any human endeavour. The masses love apathy. The minority understand empathy. The balance is out of kilter.It is not okay to distort the result. There are many cynics with no means to change the order. There may be many who be jaded as you.
I think domestic violence is a direct indicator of stress, mainly food insecurity type stress as it is humiliating and has been made intentionally so I think with the bright green food card which you still have to sign for at checkout in front of all the waiting customers. Food insecurity is a shocking fact in this land of primary production, a scandal, even. Also it is a proven fact that vitamin & mineral deficiencies cause chemical imbalances in the melon, ergo... well, the other shameful fact in this country of timber and abundant raw materials (not coal and oil, btw) is the number of homeless people being allowed to die in undignified circumstances (where is the Blanket Man foundation?) and homelessness is incredibly stressful but the any violence done by or to a homeless person would not be "domestic" would it? So the police must be busy spying on people scratching themselves and playing video games because: http://www.3news.co.nz/Hundreds-of-violent-offenders-evade-capture/tabid/423/articleID/250476/Default.aspx
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