Durban - Home and business robberies in some Durban suburbs decreased by more than 90 per cent in over the festive season, Blue Security revealed on Monday after analysing their crime trends.
In a statement, Blue Security operations director Brian Jackson said the firm’s analysis of crime statistics showed an overall average 37% decline in the number of crime and other incidents such as vehicle accidents and deaths due to suicide and medical conditions reported to the company.
The study covered the period during the build-up to the festive season from December 1 2018 to January 7 2019 compared to the same period in 2017/18.
According to the study crimes that showed the highest decrease included:
- Business armed robbery 95%
- Residential armed robbery 92%
- Assault 77%
- Hijacking 50%
- Attempted business burglary 57%
- Attempted residential housebreaking 39%
Jackson added that according to the crime statistics other crimes that decreased included residential housebreaking (5%); business burglary (8%) and theft of motor vehicle which declined 17%. Incidents of vandalism increased by 41% , trespassing by 33% and the number of shootings doubled.
“While it is good news that serious crimes such as armed robbery and hijacking dropped during the period it is a concern that incidents of vandalism, trespassing and shootings showed an increase,” Jackson said.
“It is important to note that these statistics include only those crime incidents reported to our company for the period which covers just around five weeks,” he said.
According to the crime report most crimes took place in the early hours of the morning between 2am and 6am and in the evenings between 6pm and 8pm, while there were also a substantial number of incidents that took place 10am and 3pm.
Jackson added that it was unclear why the number of serious crimes such as business and residential armed robberies had declined dramatically during the recent festive season.
He said possible reasons could be due to improved visible policing by security firms who are working closely with property owners to fight crime, coupled with the arrest of suspects and the fact that several armed robbers had been killed during shootings over the past year.