REBECCA Marie Coulter hangs out in the city on weekends, drinking and dancing her way through the club scene like many women her age.

Sadly, like thousands of her peers, the teenager has also been involved in the ugliness of the growing "ladette" culture.

In November last year, the 18-year-old pushed a complete stranger into a wall, punched her repeatedly in the face and then bashed her with her shoes.

It was one of the thousands of female-initiated crimes reported to police each year - a number Victims of Crime Commissioner Michael O'Connell says is growing because Adelaide has the "perfect climate" for violence.

"South Australia's weather and culture means you can party 365 days a year, to very late at night, while consuming large quantities of drugs and alcohol," he said.

"Changes in lifestyle have seen more women out in public places - meaning more victims and perpetrators - and the nightclub precinct is concentrated in a very small area."

"You have people fighting for that small space and problems becoming exaggerated . . . it's the perfect climate in which violent crime can happen."

But East Adelaide local service area commander Superintendent John Thomas said that climate could be changed.

"It's not just a matter of people behaving badly and coppers locking them up. It puts enormous strain on our emergency services," Supt Thomas said.

"Why should the public pay a huge cost just so a few people can drink whenever they want?"

Police statistics revealed in the Sunday Mail in April, show girls account for one-quarter of all assaults perpetrated by teenagers.

Girls aged between 10 and 19 committed 4211 crimes last year, a 43 per cent increase on the 2005-06 figure of 2925.

Yesterday, Coulter pleaded guilty to the aggravated assault that police prosecutors said occurred at 12.30am on November 8.

They said that as Coulter and her friends made their way down Hindley St, they "exchanged words" with another group of girls.

Coulter then stepped in front of one young woman and pushed her into a wall.

Police said the victim was spat on and "kneed" in the stomach.

Coulter, they said, punched the girl in the face and arms, then took off her shoes and hit her victim in the head. Coulter - who laughed at times when the prosecutor spoke - was quick to correct one part of the allegations.

"I didn't spit on her or knee her in the stomach, but I did the rest of it," she said.

Magistrate Alfio Grasso asked Coulter why she had committed the assault.

"I'm not really too sure, I had never met that girl before," she said. "I was drunk at the time . . . we'd been to the Empire Pool Hall and Club 58. I don't normally drink that much."

Mr Grasso said he was prepared to accept that Coulter did not spit on the victim, nor strike her with her knee.

"If you had, I certainly would have considered imprisonment," he said.

He fined Coulter $700 but did not record a conviction.

"This sort of offending is far too prevalent and ugly, to say the least," he said. "Miss Coulter, I'm here to tell you that you cannot afford to ever touch a person again."

Coulter replied: "I never will."

Mr O'Connell said closing Hindley St venues earlier would not solve the problem.

"You push more people into that small space ... and you create the very situation you tried to avoid," he said.

Originally published as Ladettes the new face of crime