Crime across most of NSW has remained stable or fallen in the two years to June 2020.
The only major exception to this is sexual assault which rose 9.4% year-on-year to June 2020. A similar upward trend was reported in the previous quarterly report.
Four offences have trended down over the last 24 months. The remaining 12 offences were stable. The offences trending down were:
- Robbery without a weapon (down 12.6%)
- Steal from motor vehicle (down 12.1%)
- Steal from person (down 25.4%)
- Malicious damage to property (down 5.4%)
As previously reported, crime patterns were significantly interrupted in April 2020 by the pandemic response. In June 2020, recorded incidents of break ins, car theft and retail theft were still considerably lower than the same period in 2019.
Greater Sydney Statistical Area
Sexual assault increased in two of the 15 Sydney Statistical Areas:
- Blacktown (up 24.4%, or 71 additional incidents)
- Sutherland (up 59.2%, or 45 additional incidents)
The only other major offence category with a significant upward trend in the Greater Sydney Statistical Area was domestic assault. Two Sydney regions had a significant increase in recorded rates of domestic assault in the past two years:
- Baulkham Hills & Hawkesbury (up 32.7%, or 123 additional incidents),
- Parramatta (up 9.9% or 175 additional incidents)
Regional NSW
Regional NSW saw the following significant upward trends:
- Three of the 13 statistical areas showed a significant increase in recorded rates of sexual assault;
- Hunter Valley excluding Newcastle (up 19.7% or 59 additional incidents),
- Illawarra (up 33.7% or 66 additional incidents), and:
- Southern Highlands and Shoalhaven (up 63.9% or 62 additional incidents).
- Domestic violence related assault increased in the Murray (up 25.1% or 127 additional incidents)
Commenting on the findings, Executive Director of BOCSAR, Jackie Fitzgerald, said the continuing increase in reported sexual assaults is a worrying trend. "It appears that at least some of the increase in sexual assault is related to an increase in secondary and mandatory reporting of child sexual assault. We will continue to closely monitor trends in this offence."
