Did You Know?
You can view the Western Australia Police Force Crime Statistics Report.
Understanding Crime Stats in Western Australia
Ever wondered where crime statistics come from and what they really mean? The WA Police Force provides a lot of information about crime in our state, and it can be really useful to understand what these stats tell us.
Where Do the Numbers Come From?
The WA Police collect crime data through their Incident Management System (IMS). Basically, every time a crime is reported to the police, or they become aware of it, it goes into this system. These stats are updated every three months – February, May, August, and November. It's important to remember that these numbers can change as police investigations continue, so the most recent data may be revised.
What Do the Stats Tell Us?
Location Matters: Crime stats are tied to where the crime happened.
More Than Just Numbers: The stats are influenced by things like population size, the number of shops, the time of year, and how much crime gets reported.
Offence Count vs. People Count: One crime can have many victims or offenders and one person may be involved in multiple offenses, so the number of offenses doesn't represent the number of victims or offenders.
Different Definitions: The WA Police use specific definitions for different offenses, which are based on Australian standards, WA laws, and police reporting needs. This means the same crime might be counted differently in other places or might have a broader or narrower definition than what you might expect.
Crime Rate: The rate of crime is often given as a number per 100,000 people. This helps us compare crime in different areas, regardless of population.
Sanction Rate: This tells us how many offenders are processed.
How Can You Access the Data?
You can find crime statistics on the WA Police Force website.
Once you are on the webpage you will see the following report which you can interact with. You are able to open the report in full-screen mode by clicking on the highlighted icon shown below:
Once in full-screen mode there are a number of options you can change to narrow down the data to just your suburb if you wanted.
By default, we are looking at “offences by calendar year” from this view you can filter by:
- Year Range
- Region
- Suburb
- Offence category
- Office type
As an example here we are looking at the crime statistics for Victoria Park between 2020 and 2024
Another example here we compare 3 suburbs (Victoria Park, Willeton and Karinya) for the 2024 year.
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