Cape Town - More than 2 300 children found themselves in conflict with the law in the Western Cape with the youngest group 33 10-year-old boys.
This emerged from Minister Bheki Cele’s quarterly crime statistics released on Friday.
While the majority of crimes committed by children saw a decline, attempted sexual offences increased by 7% while contact sexual offences increased by 300%.
As many as 604 incidents of rape were reported against children, which also was lower than last year’s figure of 727.
From July to September, 152 murders were committed by children – this constituted a 29% decrease when compared to the same period last year.
Carjackings, however, recorded an increase of 11% as well as theft out of or from a motor vehicle.
In the Western Cape, 2 349 children between the ages of 10 and 17 found themselves on the wrong side of the law.
In just three months, as many as 790 17-year-old boys and 530 16-year-olds were accused of crimes.
Betzi Pierce from the SA National Institute for Crime Prevention and the Reintegration of Offenders (NICRO) said the environment children grow up in influences their behaviour.
“Children often get involved with crime based on a host of factors, their environment and the situation at home, with the family unit and its stability being the biggest contributors. Domestic violence, child neglect and abuse is what we observe being a present factor when we evaluate children,” she said.
“And if a child grows up in an environment where gang life is rife and that child does not have a strong foundation at home, the possibility of them getting involved in gang life is that much higher.
“Right now we are gearing our programmes towards prevention levels after we realised that there is a problem with the number of cases some provincial departments of social development refer to us for intervention for children involved in crime.
“So we are working towards identifying children who are at risk for falling into a life of crime and provide intervention programmes,” she added.
Although not mentioned in this quarter’s crime stats, child murders continue to persist in numerous communities around the province, particularly those who find themselves caught in gang crossfires.
On Tuesday, a 3-year-old was hit by a stray bullet near his home in Scottsdene, in Kraaifontein, and the week before, a 9-year-old boy was shot and killed after he was caught in suspected gang crossfire in Wallacedene.