Police have painted a clearer picture of the ram-raid offending causing havoc across the country.
Two data sets released on Thursday show the extent of ram-raid offending, as police previously did not count ram-raids separately in their reporting system. So to bring together the ram-raid-specific information, police text-mined data and searched and reviewed files.
One set was created with the end goal of determining whether retail outlets might be eligible to be supported through the Retail Crime Prevention Programme. This data holds reviewed instances as far back as January 1, 2021.
It found there were 519 ram-raids in 2022, up from 295 in 2021. While in the first two months of 2023, there were 58 ram-raids, 36 in January and 22 in February. The statistics are current as of March 15, 2023.
Out of the police districts, Waikato had the most number of ram-raids over the two years and two months released, followed by Auckland, then Counties Manukau. The data showed there were far more ram-raids in the North Island, with the largest number of ram-raids in the South Island occurring in Canterbury (47).
The next set of data was created to be able to report against questions regarding historic and current volumes of ram-raids, and to compare against other crime types. It initially included only retail ram-raids but in January 2023 was retrospectively widened to include both retail and commercial ram-raid data.
The data confirms that youths are dominating the ram-raid scene, with youth offenders largely outweighing adults.
The youth/adult breakdown for ram-raids shows a large increase in the number of youth offenders from around mid-2021, as the number of ram-raids grows.
In line with the increase in youth offenders is an increase in youth referrals made to ram-raid offenders. The data shows a rise in this type of enforcement action from 2021.
It also found the most common property type targeted by ram-raiders were shops, followed by commercial properties.
The data is drawn from live data sets for both and because information can be updated, numbers in each can change depending on when the data is sourced, the police noted.
"Police operational data will always be live data that can change as investigations progress. From an operational perspective this is not an issue as the pattern of offences will be visible at the local and district level, and policing deployment choices and investigations will follow," Assistant Commissioner Bruce O'Brien said in a statement.
"Our focus is on having information which will support our people to do their jobs – preventing crime and holding offenders to account. I am confident the data we have is supporting our people to do that.
"At the same time, it's important to recognise that police alone cannot solve some of the complex societal issues at play. We are committed to working with our partners and communities as we know we don’t hold all the answers."
