One Crime Every 4 min.

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31211, 8 November 1966, Page 3

One Crime Every 4 min.

(N Z. Press Association)

WELLINGTON, November 7. Crimes were committed in New Zealand last year at the rate of one every four minutes, Detective Sergeant R. L. Butler, director of the police crime prevention section, said in Wellington today. The value of property stolen last year, on conservative estimates, amounted to £2 million, he told senior Wellington insurance officer attending a special course in crime prevention. The increase in crime in New Zealand in recent years 'concerned the police. ‘ In all. 132,311 crimes had i been committed last year—lan increase of 30,000 on the figures for 1960. One of the biggest single increases had been in the number of burglaries. These had almost doubled in the last five years to 13,961 last year. There had been 50,415 other theft in 1965, an increase of about 5000 since 1960.

land C. 1.8., Detective-Super-intendent R. J. Walton, said it was significant that in the two fields of crime in which the section had concentrated its initial efforts, the passing of fraudulent cheques and car conversion, there has been slight decreases this year, compared with slight increases in other crimes.

The head of the New Zea-1 Detective - Sergeant Butler said that most crimes against property in New Zealand were committed on the spur of the moment because temptation was put in someone’s way. Only a few were carefully planned. Inquiries showed that usually the victims of the crime had been careless and had provided the opportunity for the criminal.