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Police data shows almost 200 farm attacks in three months
Farm attacks continued during the past three months despite level 4 and 3 lockdown regulations that were in place police statistics show.
Photo: Unsplash
There were almost 200 farm attacks during the first quarter of 2021 according to the latest police crime statistics released on Friday.
Police Minister Bheki Cele released the crime statistics for the period April 2021 to June 2021 at a media briefing.
According to the latest data there were 181 attacks on farms and small-holdings for the period and 119 of the incidents were robbery related, resulting in 15 murders.
A total of 5760 people were killed between April 2021 until the end of June 2021, which was 2 294 more murders than in 2020 when the county was in a hard level 5 lockdown and recorded a dramatic drop in crime.
Cele said it was important to contextualise the latest data by comparing it to the same period in 2019 when there was no lockdown in place.
Cele said that from a sample of 4 467 cases a total of 2 531 people had been murdered in public places like on the street, in open fields, parking areas and abandoned buildings. Some 1 385 murders occurred at the home of the victim or of the perpetrator. A total of 206 of the murders occurred at liquor outlets, which are the fourth most likely place to be killed in the country.
Property Related crimes increased by 6.0% for the period.
“Police continue to clamp down on Stock theft, which recorded a decrease of 8.0%. If comparison was made to the normal period of 2019/2020 this would have resulted in a 13.5% decrease,” Cele said.
Stock theft decreased in six of the nine provinces with the highest volume decrease recorded in the Eastern Cape that reported 398 fewer cases. Burglary at non-residential premises declined drastically by 22.4%.
“That number would have decreased by 15.3% if compared to the 2019/2020 financial period,” he said.
“All assault categories reported double digit increases compared to the distorted reporting period on 2020/2021 period,” Cele said.
He said a total of 76 936 cases of common assault and assault GBH were opened with the police in the three months of reporting.
“Over 15 thousand of the cases were domestic violence related, meaning the victim and perpetrator have a relationship,” he said.
The top three areas of occurrence of these assaults are at the home of the victim or perpetrator, public places and liquor outlets. Arguments were far the leading causes of the assaults.
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