Significant increase in burglaries and theft offences – CSO figures

There has been a significant increase in the number of burglaries and related offences, according to the newly released figures from the Central Statistics Office (CSO).

The figures show that burglary offences rose by 10%, or 878 individual incidents, to 9,981 incidents.

An increase in the incidents of non-aggravated burglary accounted for most of the change, according to the CSO.

The figures relate to the period of July through to September 2024, and compares statistics from the same period from the previous year.

There was also a rise of 7% – or 5,331 incidents – of theft offences, with six out of every 10 incidents in this increase due to theft from shops.

There were also increases in the number of crime incidents relating to kidnapping and related offences, which increased by some 16.

Weapons and explosive offences also increased by 11%, while public order and other social code offences rose by 3%.

Homicide and related offences fell by 12% to 75 incidents in the same period.

Nearly all of this decrease was accounted for by a fall in incidents of dangerous driving leading to death, which fell by 24%.

The number of victims of attempted murder and threats to murder as well as assaults and harassment rose by 3%, to a total of 24,174 recorded crime incidents.

While this was slightly higher than the 23,880 and 23,461 incidents recorded in 2023 and 2022 respectively, it exceeded the levels in 2020 and 2021 by more than 4,000 incidents.

The figures also show that the number of male victims increased by 3% and the number of female victims was up 1%.

An analysis of crime trends shows that recorded crime incidents involving controlled drug offences and dangerous or negligent acts in the third quarter of last year were at their lowest over the five-year period between 2020 and 2024.

These types of offences includes dangerous driving leading to serious injury and driving while under the influence of alcohol or drugs.

In 2020, there were 8,861 recorded crime incidents of this type and this fell to 8,123 incidents in 2021 before rising to 8,562 in 2022.

The number of incidents fell to 7,548 in 2023 and was 7,541 from July to September last year.

However, the trend shows that the number of incidents related to theft, attempted murder and threats to murder as well as assaults and harassment were at their highest.

The figures also show that there were 16,295 recorded crime incidents of controlled drug offences in the same period of last year.

In 2020, there were 22,403 recorded crime incidents of this offence type and this was down to 21,416 by 2021.

There was a sharp fall to just over 17,400 crime incidents in both 2022 and 2023 before settling at 16,295 in 2024, the lowest over the five-year period.

James Dalton, statistician in the CSO’s crime and criminal justice section, said: “Recorded Crime statistics published today for July, August and September 2024 showed that the number of recorded crime incidents of burglary and related offences and theft and related offences increased while those relating to homicide and related offences fell in the year to the third quarter.”

The largest rate of increase for incidents involving burglary offences was for the southern region at 23%, followed by the eastern region which increased by 9% while the Dublin Metropolitan Region had the lowest rate of increase at 5%.