CRIME STATISTICS REPORT FOR 3RD QUARTER 2003



CRIME STATISTICS REPORT FOR 4th QUARTER 2003

Background

The Bureau of Statistics (BoS) analyzes secondary data on crime; this data is collected and tabulated by the Planning and Research Unit, of the Department of Police to produce quarterly reports on crime statistics. The Police Department collects data on cases of crime from all Police Stations throughout the country, and the information is compiled from all Police Stations according to regions and districts. Therefore, this report is intended to present data compiled for the fourth quarter of 2003.

Police Stations are categorized into three regions, which comprise of Central Region; which is represented by Maseru Urban, Maseru Rural and Thaba-Tseka. Then Northern Region, which includes Berea, Leribe, Butha-Buthe and Mokhotlong. The third region is Southern Region, which includes Mafeteng, Mohale’s Hoek, Quthing and Qacha’s Nek.

This report mainly focuses on all cases of crime reported at the Police Stations regardless of actions taken thereafter. Since there are different types of cases of crime reported at the Police Stations, the Planning and Research Unit has classified them into two main groups. The first group is Serious Crime, which includes: House Breaking, Stock Theft, Robbery, and Ass.G.B.H. (Assault with intend to Grievous Bodily Harm), Murder, Attempted Murder, Rape and Car Theft. The second group is Common Crime and it is categorized into Theft Common, Assault Common and Traffic Offences. Common Offences, as opposed to Serious Offences, occur on a large scale while the occurrences are fewer on the latter.

As a point of improvement, the statistical report for the fourth quarter 2004 will include new types of cases under Serious Crime, these are: Fraud, Drugs, Arms and Counterfeit Currency. The report will also include information on cases reported, unaccepted, solved, cases awaiting trial, cases pending investigation and persons arrested.

Unlike with other statistics produced by BoS, data on crime is not classified by age, sex and socio-economic categories because; it deals with activities, not with persons directly involved.

1 Reported Serious Cases of Crime

1.1 Serious Cases of Crime and Type

Figure 1.1 depicts the serious cases of crime for the third quarter of 2003; (July to September). Observing individual types of crime for the third quarter and comparing with those of the fourth quarter, it is only the proportion of Stock-theft that has shown a considerable increase from the third quarter to the fourth quarter. House-Breaking, Robbery, Ass.G.B.H and Rape have shown some decrease in percentages, while Murder, Att. Murder and Car theft reported cases experienced a slight decrease between the third quarter and the fourth quarter of 2003.

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Figure 1.2 presents reported serious cases of crime from all police stations for the fourth quarter (October to December) of the year 2003. There was a total of 4,554 serious cases of crime reported during this quarter. House-Breaking was the mostly reported case of all serious cases of crime (32.5 percent), followed by Stock theft with 23.7 percent.

The other reported serious cases had lower frequencies and these include Assault with intent to Grievous Bodily Harm (Ass.G.B.H) with 15.0 percent; and the lowest reported cases were Attempted Murder and Car Theft with 2.8 and 3.0 percent respectively. Other cases of serious crime included Robbery, Rape and Murder, and their percentages ranged from 5.2 percent to 9.1 percent.

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1.2 Serious Cases of Crime and Regions

Central region reported 38.2 percent of all cases while Northern region reported 37.4 percent and Southern region reported 24.4 percent. The most common crime reported in these regions during this quarter were House-Breaking (32.5 percent), Stock Theft (23.7 percent) and Ass.G.B.H (15.0 percent).

As depicted by Figure 1.3, in Central region, of all crime cases reported, 40.1 percent were House-Breaking while Stock Theft followed with 16.1 percent. Other types of crime had lower frequencies, ranging from Robbery with 12.7 percent to the lowest, which is Att. Murder with 3.1 percent.

Figure 1.3 further shows that Stock Theft constituted 33.8 percent of the serious cases reported during the fourth quarter in the Northern Region, and was the most reported case of the serious cases of crime. House Breaking was the second most reported serious type of crime in this Northern region, and it constituted 26.7 percent of the reported cases. Attempted Murder and Car Theft were the least reported cases of crime in the region during the fourth quarter 2003, each reporting 2.7 percent and 3.1 percent of the cases respectively.

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It is depicted by Figure 1.3 that House Breaking was the mostly reported serious type of crime in the Southern region, constituting 29.7 percent of the serious types of crime reported in this region. It was followed by Ass.G.B.H and Stock Theft which constituted 24.5 and 20.3 percent of serious reported cases of crime respectively. Car theft was the least reported serious type of crime, with only 1.8 percent of its cases; it was followed by Attempted Murder and Robbery with 2.5 and 5.5 percent respectively. The remaining types of crime, Murder and Rape only constituted 6.1 and 9.6 percent of the serious cases reported during this quarter in the Southern region.

1.3 Serious Cases of Crime and Districts

In the data following hereafter, Maseru district data shall be defined as Maseru*, which is the data combination of Maseru Rural Police Station and Maseru Urban Police Station.

|Table 1.1: Absolute Value and Percentage Distribution of all Serious Cases|

|of Crime by Districts for the 4th Quarter 2003 |

| Districts |Number |Percentage |

| Maseru* |1,505 |33.0 |

| Thaba-Tseka |235 |5.2 |

| Berea |439 |9.6 |

| Leribe |718 |15.8 |

| Butha-Buthe |290 |6.4 |

| Mokhotlong |255 |5.6 |

| Mafeteng |473 |10.4 |

| Mohale's Hoek |236 |5.2 |

| Quthing |206 |4.5 |

| Qacha's Nek |197 |4.3 |

| Total |4,554 |100.0 |

| Source: Research and Planning Unit - Police Head Quarters |

Table 1.1 presents the percentage distribution of all serious crime by districts. It is shown that, out of 4,554 cases reported, Maseru district had reported most cases of crime (33.0 percent). It was followed by Leribe and Mafeteng with 15.8 and 10.4 percent respectively. The remaining districts (Thaba-Tseka, Berea, Butha-Buthe, Mokhotlong, Mohale’s Hoek, Quthing and Qacha’s Nek) had percentages ranging from 4.3 to 9.6 of reported cases of crime.

1.4 Serious Cases of Crime by District and Month

It is observed in Table 1.2 that the overall change in reported cases of crime from October to November decreased by 13.4 percent; and from November to December, there was a huge increase of 20.4 percent of cases of crime reported.

|Table 1.2: Absolute Value and Percentage Changes of Serious Reported Cases of Crime the 4th Quarter 2003 |

| Districts |Reported Cases |Percentage Change of Reported Cases |

| | October | November | December | October to | November to |

| | | | |November |December |

| Maseru* | 518 | 446 | 541 | -13.9 | 21.3 |

| Thaba-Tseka | 84 | 55 | 96 | -34.5 | 74.5 |

| Berea | 157 | 139 | 143 | -11.5 | 2.9 |

| Leribe | 271 | 200 | 247 | -26.2 | 23.5 |

| Butha-Buthe | 100 | 74 | 116 | -26.0 | 56.8 |

| Mokhotlong | 80 | 67 | 108 | -16.3 | 61.2 |

| Mafeteng | 161 | 166 | 146 | 3.1 | -12.0 |

| Mohale's Hoek | 78 | 65 | 93 | -16.7 | 43.1 |

| Quthing | 60 | 75 | 71 | 25.0 | -5.3 |

| Qacha's Nek | 57 | 69 | 71 | 21.1 | 2.9 |

| Total | 1,566 | 1,356 | 1,632 | -13.4 | 20.4 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit – Police Head Quarters |

As shown in Table 1.4, from October to November, most districts experienced a decrease in a number of serious reported cases. For example, Thaba-Tseka district reported a 34.5 percent decrease of reported serious cases of crime from October to November; and this was the largest decrease when comparing with other districts. Thaba-Tseka district was followed by Leribe and Butha-Buthe districts with 26.2 and 26.0 percent decrease of serious reported cases respectively. Only the districts of Quthing, Qacha’s Nek and Mafeteng experienced an increase in the reported number of serious cases; 25.0 percent, 21.1 percent and 3.1 percent respectively. Table 1.4 further shows that in all districts except for Mafeteng and Quthing districts, there was an increase in a number of reported serious cases in other districts from November to December 2003.

Figure 1.4 depicts percentage distribution of all serious cases of crime by districts and months, for the fourth quarter 2003 (October, November and December). In October, Maseru reported 33.1 percent of crime cases. Maseru being the district with the highest crime rate was followed by Leribe district with 17.3 percent of reported crime cases during this month, then Mafeteng with 10.3 percent. These three districts have reported the highest crime cases throughout the months of November to December, in the same order, that is Maseru reporting the majority of cases, followed by Leribe and then Mafeteng. The reason might be that these districts have the largest population which account for 50 percent of the total population of Lesotho, while the other 50 percent is shared by the remaining seven districts (1996 census of Population and Housing Statistical Tables).

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Figure 1.4 further indicates that Qacha’s Nek reported the lowest crime cases (3.6 percent) for the month of October. It was followed by Quthing and Mohale’s Hoek with 3.8 and 5.0 percent respectively. Figure 1.4 again shows that in November, Thaba-Tseka reported the least number of serious cases of crime, (4.1 percent), it was followed by Mohale’s Hoek and Mokhotlong with 4.1 and 4.9 percent respectively. In December, the districts with the least reported cases were Qacha’s Nek and Quthing with 4.4 percent each and Mohale’s Hoek with 5.1 percent; these districts had also reported the least number of common cases during October.

2 Behavior of Each Type of Serious Cases of Crime and Police Stations

2.1 House Breaking

According to Figure 2.1, House-breaking is the most common of all types of reported cases of crime. For instance, Maseru urban police station reported approximately a third of all House-breaking cases (33.5 percent); Leribe followed with 15.4 percent and Maseru rural with 11.4 percent. Mokhotlong was the police station with the lowest reported House-Breaking cases, representing 1.5 percent of all House-Breaking cases committed.

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2.2 Stock Theft

Stock Theft was second highest of all reported cases of crime during the fourth quarter 2003. Observations from Figure 2.2 are that, Leribe police station had reported the majority of Stock Theft cases with 17.6 percent, followed by Mokhotlong and Maseru Rural police station, which reported an estimated 15.4 and 14.7 percent respectively of Stock Theft cases. Maseru Urban Police Station reported the lowest cases of Stock Theft,(0.8 percent).

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2.3 Robbery

As presented by Figure 2.3, Maseru Urban Police Station has reported by far the majority of Robbery cases (48.5 percent), Leribe Police Station which ranked second to Maseru Police Station reported 10.8 percent, making a difference of 37.7 percent in between these two police stations. Qacha’s Nek, Mokhotlong and Quthing police stations reported the lowest cases of Robbery, representing 1.3 percent each.

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2.4 Murder

Murder is one type of crime with low frequencies of reported cases following Car theft and Attempted Murder, and it constitutes 5.2 percent of all reported cases of crime during this quarter. Figure 2.4 depicts that Maseru Rural experienced the highest proportion of Murder cases of crime (16.9 percent) for this quarter, that is, October to December. Leribe and Maseru Urban Police stations were second and third after Maseru Rural Police Station with 15.6 and 15.2 percent of murder cases respectively. The police stations that experienced the lowest Murder proportions were Quthing and Qacha’s Nek, with each constituting 3.4 percent.

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2.5 Attempted Murder

|Table 2.1: Percentage and Absolute Value Distribution of Att. Murder by |

|Police Stations for the 4th Quarter 2003 |

| Police | Att. Murder |Percentage |

|Stations | | |

| Maseru Urban |17 |13.2 |

| Maseru Rural |32 |24.8 |

| Thaba-Tseka |6 | 4.7 |

| Berea |13 |10.1 |

| Leribe |24 |18.6 |

| Butha-Buthe |5 | 3.9 |

| Mokhotlong |4 | 3.1 |

| Mohale's Hoek |2 | 1.6 |

| Mafeteng |22 |17.1 |

| Quthing |2 | 1.6 |

| Qacha's Nek |2 | 1.6 |

| Total |129 |100.0 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit - Police Head Quarters |

Attempted murder was the lowest of all reported crime cases during this fourth quarter 2003, as it constituted 2.8 percent of the reported cases. Table 2.1, depicts that Maseru Rural and Leribe Police Stations reported the highest attempted murder cases as compared to other police stations; their percentages were 24.8 and 18.6 respectively. On the other hand, Quthing, Qacha’s Nek and Mohale’s Hoek reported the lowest cases of attempted murder for this quarter, with 1.6 percent for each of the three police stations. Other police stations reported Attempted Murder cases which ranged from 3.1 to 17.1 percent.

2.6 Assault with intend to Grievous Bodily Harm (Ass.G.B.H.)

Ass.G.B.H. constituted 15.0 percent of all cases of crime reported, and the mean value of all percentages of crime was 12.5, meaning Ass.G.B.H. occurred reasonably as compared to other types of crime.

Figure 2.5 shows percentages of reported cases of Ass.G.B.H in different police stations over from period of October to December, 2003. Mafeteng Police Station reported the majority of cases that were of Ass.G.B.H. nature, (18.5 percent). Leribe police station followed with 14.3 percent. The police stations that reported the lowest cases of Ass.G.B.H were Qacha’s Nek and Mokhotlong, with percentages as low as 3.9 and 4.1 respectively.

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2.7 Rape

Rape was one of the lowest types of crime reported during the fourth quarter of 2003, with its rate of occurrence estimated at 9.1 percent of all types of crime.

Figure 2.6 presents percentage distribution of rape cases in different police stations. According to this Figure, Leribe Police Station had the highest reported cases of rape (16.1 percent), it was followed by Maseru Urban Police Station with 15.7 percent. Qacha’s Nek, Quthing and Mokhotlong had the lowest reported cases of rape, with 1.9, 4.1 and 4.1 percent respectively.

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2.8 Car Theft

Car theft is the second lowest reported case of crime following Attempted Murder, with a rate of occurrence estimated at 3.0 percent of all reported cases of crime during the fourth quarter 2003.

Figure 2.7 presents percentage distribution of car theft in different police stations. Maseru Urban Police Station had the highest reported cases of car theft (40.0 percent) and was followed by Leribe Police Station with 23.7 percent. The lowest percentage value of car theft was 0.7, and was reported at the three police stations of Qacha’s Nek, Mokhotlong and Thaba-Tseka.

The reason as to why car theft is mostly reported in Maseru and Leribe may be that, most of the places in these districts are accessible for car maneuvering; whereas most areas in the three districts of Qacha’s Nek, Mokhotlong and Thaba-Tseka are not accessible.

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3 Common Cases of Crime

3.1 Reported Common Cases of Crime

|Table 3.1: Number and Type of Common Cases of Crime by Districts for the 4th Quarter 2003 |

| Districts |Theft common |Assault common |Traffic offences |Total |

| | | | | |

| Maseru* |911 |1,122 |3,181 |5,214 |

| Thaba-Tseka |55 |123 |72 |250 |

| Berea |111 |252 |1,626 |1,989 |

| Leribe |214 |296 |983 |1,493 |

| Butha-Buthe |74 |120 |418 |612 |

| Mokhotlong |53 |118 |155 |326 |

| Mafeteng |138 |204 |710 |1,052 |

| Mohale's Hoek |103 |191 |695 |989 |

| Quthing |82 |145 |490 |717 |

| Qacha's Nek |30 |87 |211 |328 |

| Total |1,771 |2,658 |8,541 |12,970 |

| Percentage |13.7 |20.5 |65.9 |100 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit – Police Head Quarters |

|* Aggregated Urban and Rural |

Table 3.1 presents all common cases of crime, which were reported in all the police stations during the fourth quarter 2003. There was a total of 12,970 common cases reported during this quarter. Of all the cases reported, traffic offences constituted the majority of these cases (65. 9 percent), followed by assault common then theft common with 20.5 and 13.7 percent respectively.

Table 3.2 presents the percentage distribution of common cases of crime by districts. For theft common, Maseru (both Urban and Rural Police Stations) had reported the majority (51.4 percent) of this type of crime. Leribe district recorded second highest percentage of 12.1 and there was a large difference of 39.3 percent of Theft common cases reported between these two districts.

|Table 3.2: Percentage Distribution of Common Crime Cases by Districts for the 4th |

|Quarter 2003 |

| Districts |Theft common |Assault common |Traffic offences |

| Maseru* |51.4 |42.2 |37.2 |

| Thaba-Tseka | 3.1 | 4.6 |0.8 |

| Berea | 6.3 | 9.5 |19.0 |

| Leribe |12.1 |11.1 |11.5 |

| Butha-Buthe | 4.2 |4.5 |4.9 |

| Mokhotlong | 3.0 |4.4 |1.8 |

| Mafeteng | 7.8 |7.7 |8.3 |

| Mohale's Hoek | 5.8 |7.2 |8.1 |

| Quthing | 4.6 |5.5 |5.7 |

| Qacha's Nek | 1.7 |3.3 |2.5 |

| Total |100 |100 |100 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit – Police Head Quarters |

|* Aggregated Urban and Rural |

According to Table 3.2, Maseru district leads with reported assault common cases (42.2 percent) and it is followed by Leribe with 11.1 percent. Concerning traffic offences, Leribe comes third with 11.5 percent, following Maseru and Berea which reported 37.2 and 19.0 percent respectively of traffic offences. Qacha’s Nek had the lowest reported cases of theft common and assault common, for both of these types of crime, it was followed by Mokhotlong. For traffic offences, Thaba-Tseka had the least reported cases (0.8 percent) and it was followed by Mokhotlong (1.8 percent) then Qacha’s Nek with 2.5 percent.

On average, for all common crime cases reported during this quarter, that is, October to December, Maseru Police Station had the majority of reported cases followed by Leribe and Berea. Thaba-Tseka had the least reported cases followed by Mokhotlong and Qacha’s Nek.

3.2 Common Cases of Crime by Districts and Months

Table 3.3 presents the actual numbers of common cases of crime reported for the months of October, November and December by districts. Observing the overall change of common crime from October to December (3,867 cases to 4,350 cases); there was an increase of 12.5 percent of reported crime cases, a further increase of 9.3 percent from November to December (4,350 cases to 4,753 cases).

|Table 3.3: Absolute Numbers of Common Cases of Crime By Districts and Months for|

|the 4th Quarter 2003 |

| Districts |October |November |December |

| Maseru* |1,089 |2,232 |1,893 |

| Thaba-Tseka |104 |64 |82 |

| Berea |703 |577 |709 |

| Leribe |527 |424 |542 |

| Butha-Buthe |198 |163 |251 |

| Mokhotlong |106 |104 |116 |

| Mafeteng |443 |373 |236 |

| Mohale's Hoek |419 |215 |355 |

| Quthing |201 |127 |389 |

| Qacha's Nek |77 |71 |180 |

|Total |3,867 |4,350 |4,753 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit – Police Head Quarters * Aggregated Urban and|

|Rural |

In Maseru district, from October to November (1,089 cases to 2,232 reported cases), there was an increase of 105.0 percent of reported crime cases, which is why the resultant overall change is an increase instead of a decrease; even though all other districts experienced a decrease of reported cases from October to November.

Table 3.3 further shows that from the month of November to December, most districts experienced an increase in a number of reported common cases. For instance, Quthing which only reported 127 cases in November, reported 389 common cases of crime in December, and this was the largest increase (206.3 percent) change on comparing with other districts.

3.3 Common Cases of Crime by Region

According to estimations from the data collected, central region constituted 42.1 percent of all common cases of crime reported in fourth quarter of 2003. It is followed by the Northern region with 34.1 percent. The Southern region has almost half the cases of the Central region; as it had an estimated 23.8 percent of all reported common cases.

Traffic offences constituted the majority of common cases, constituting 65.9 percent of these cases. It was followed by assault common cases with 20.5 percent of the common cases. Theft common cases were the least reported cases, constituting only 13.7 percent.

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According to Figure 3.1, in Central region, traffic offences constituted 59.5 percent of the common cases, while Assault common and Traffic offences constituted 22.8 and 17.7 percent of the common cases. In the Northern region, Traffic offences constituted an estimated 72.0 percent of the common cases while Assault common and Theft common constituted 17.8 and 10.2 percent respectively. Figure 3.1 further shows that in Southern region, as with other regions, Traffic offences were the mostly reported cases of common cases, constituting 68.2 percent of the common cases. Assault common and Theft common constituted 20.3 and 11.4 percent respectively of all common cases in this region.

4 Trend Analysis of Reported Cases of Crime from 1st Quarter to the 4th

Quarter 2003

The trend analysis covers the four quarters of 2003, and it deals with all reported cases of crime, be it common or serious cases within the three regions of Central, Northern and Southern.

4.1 Trend Analysis of Serious Reported Cases of Crime

Figure 4.1 depicts the trend of serious cases of crime from the first quarter to the fourth quarter of 2003. In the Northern Region, from first quarter to the second quarter, a huge percentage increase of reported cases was experienced; 63.7 percent increase, and most cases were reported in the second quarter (1,827 of reported cases). From the second quarter to the third quarter, the number of reported cases steadily decreased and there was a slight increase of 1.4 percent from third quarter to the fourth quarter.

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As shown by Figure 4.1, Central Region experienced very little increase changes from first quarter to the third. From first quarter to the second quarter, there was 0.3 percent increase.

From the second quarter to the third, there was 1.3 percent increase and from the third quarter to the fourth, an estimated 8.1 percent increase of reported cases was experienced.

It is depicted by Figure 1.4 that in the Southern region that in the first quarter, where 795 serious cases were reported, there was an increase of 9.9 percent of cases reported in the second quarter. From the second quarter to the third quarter, an even greater increase was experienced in serious reported cases (20.5 percent). There was a slight increase of reported serious cases from the third quarter to the fourth (0.1 percent).

Table 4.1 also shows that in all the three regions, regardless of the quarters, most cases reported were in the Northern region, the second quarter. The Southern region reported the lowest serious cases for all quarters. The number of reported serious cases increased from quarter to the next. There was a 9.9 percent increase of serious cases from first Quarter to the Second Quarter, 20.5 percent increase from second Quarter to the third Quarter, and lastly, a 5.6 percent increase from the third Quarter to the fourth Quarter.

|Table 4.1: Reported Serious Cases of Crime in Different Regions from 1st Quarter to the 4th in 2003 |

| | | Serious Cases of Crime | |

| Regions |1st Quarter |2nd Quarter |3rd Quarter |4th quarter |

| Central |1,584 |1,588 |1,609 |1,740 |

| Northern |1,109 | 1,827 |1,680 |1,702 |

| Southern | 795 | 874 |1,053 |1,112 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit – Police Head Quarters |

4.2 Trend Analysis of Common Cases of Crime

As observed from Figure 4.2, Central region has reported the majority of common crime cases in the first, second and last quarter of 2003. This region experienced rather erratic changes of crime reported from each quarter to the next. From the first quarter to the second, a huge increase of reported cases of crime was experienced (31.6 percent), from the second quarter to the third; there was a decrease of 23.9 percent. From the third quarter to the fourth, the highest change on comparing the three regions, quarter to quarter, there was a 34.8 percent increase of reported cases in the Central region.

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The Northern region experienced a huge increase in a number of reported cases from first quarter to the second; 27.9 percent increase. A slight increase of reported cases from the second quarter to the third, from the third quarter to the fourth, a decrease of 7.5 percent of reported cases of crime was observed in this region.

|Table 4.2: Reported Common Cases of Crime in Different Regions from 1st Quarter to the 4th in 2003 |

| | | Common Cases of Crime |

|Regions | 1st Quarter | 2nd Quarter | 3rd Quarter | 4th quarter |

|Central | | 5,325 | 4,054 | 5,464 |

| |4,047 | | | |

|Northern | 3,629 | 4,641 | 4,779 | 4,420 |

|Southern | 2,558 | 2,994 | 2,020 | 3,086 |

|Source: Research and Planning Unit-Police Head Quarters |

The Southern region followed the same pattern as the Central region, which is an increase from the first quarter to the second quarter, a decrease from the second quarter to the third, then a decrease again from third quarter to the fourth.

Southern region having experienced the lowest reported cases of crime; it also experienced some of the lowest changes of reported cases of common crime from quarter to quarter.

Summary

As has been discussed in this report, House-breaking, Stock theft and Ass.G.B.H were the serious types of crime with the highest rates of occurrences, 32.5, 23.7 and 15.0 percent respectively. Focusing on these types of crime and the districts with the highest reported serious crime cases and ranking these districts with the respective crime, Maseru district reported the highest crime cases of house-breaking and Ass.G.B.H. It ranked second after Leribe district on reported cases of Stock theft. On the other hand, Leribe followed Maseru district with cases of House-breaking, it ranked third with reported cases of Ass.G.B.H, after Maseru and Mafeteng districts. Through ranking of districts with highest reported crime cases in the fourth quarter of 2003, it can be concluded that Maseru experienced the highest serious crime cases, followed by Leribe, then Mafeteng district.

Concerning common cases of crime, it was observed that Maseru district constituted 40.2 percent of reported common cases of crime, it was followed by Berea with 15.3 percent, then Leribe District with 11.5 percent of reported common cases.

From the above discussion, it can be concluded that Central region experienced the majority of cases of crime because of Maseru district which reported most crime cases, Central region was followed by the Northern region because Berea and Leribe which also reported more crime incidences, are within this region. The Southern region constituted districts with relatively low crime rates, except for Mafeteng district, which is why it was the region with the lowest crime rate in the fourth quarter of 2003.

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