But these numbers don’t give you the whole picture, unless you factor in the total number of people who hail from each country, which you can find in the 2016 census. When you take into account the size of the population as well as the number of offenders, it shows a definite over-representation of people born in Sudan or South Sudan in the crime statistics. The data shows that about one in 10 people from Sudan or South Sudan living in Victoria were involved in a criminal incident last year, which is a far higher rate than for any of the other nationalities for which there is data. But there are few things to keep in mind about this analysis, given that it is based on combining two different data sources.

These numbers are for country of birth. First generation Australians would all be classified as having been born in Australia. Loading And this data on unique offenders does not shed any light on the types of crime being committed, their severity or whether multiple crimes are committed. What crimes are being committed? To understand whether certain groups are over-represented when it comes to certain types of crimes, we have to look at data on alleged offender incidents.

This data shows the number of crimes committed by people from a particular country of birth. It has been presented alongside figures on the size of the population to give a sense of proportion, but keep in mind that in this case this information is not one to one. If a small group of people carry out multiple offences it can greatly boost the rate for the entire community, particularly if that community is small in size. For example, there were five aggravated robberies carried out last year by those born in Liberia – a rate of 7.2 incidents for every 1000 people from that country. But what if those five aggravated burglaries were all carried out by the same person? That one person has single-handedly given Liberians in Victoria one of the highest rates of the crime, even though the other 689 would not have had any involvement in aggravated robberies. Data on Assaults:

Data on Aggravated Robberies: Data on Aggravated Burglaries:

The figures show that the incident rate for assaults, aggravated robberies and aggravated burglaries are far higher for people born in Sudan or South Sudan than other birthplaces. People from these two nations carried out 1.8 per cent of assaults, 8.5 per cent of aggravated robberies and 3.8 per cent of aggravated burglaries. And while Sudan or South Sudan combined are the 23rd most common birthplace of Victorians, they were the second most common country of birth of those connected with aggravated robberies, and third most common for serious assaults and aggravated burglaries. The Age requested additional figures from the Crime Statistics Agency breaking down the figures by local government area but this request was knocked back on privacy grounds. Have crimes been increasing?

During the past five years, the number of aggravated burglaries and robberies carried out by people of a Sudanese background has been increasing. There were 20 aggravated burglaries carried out by those from these countries between April 2012 and March 2013, making up 1.5 per cent of the state’s aggravated burglaries. But between April 2017 and March 2018, there were 70 – 3.8 per cent of the state’s aggravated burglaries. There were 127 aggravated robberies carried out by Sudanese-born offenders in the 12 months to March 2013, making up six per cent of aggravated robberies. And in the 12 months to March 2018 there were 191, making up 8.5 per cent of all aggravated robberies in Victoria.