CHO breaches and family violence rise as Victoria’s crime rate falls to the lowest level since 2015

A fall in opportunistic crime has driven Victoria’s crime rate down to the lowest rate since 2015.

In the 12 months to the end of June, crime was down by 3.7 per cent compared to the previous year.

Criminal incidents such as burglaries, thefts and robberies fell by 6.6 per cent.

Deputy Commissioner Rick Nugent says opportunistic crime has plummeted.

“Opportunities were removed with the lockdown,” he told Neil Mitchell.

“It’s unsurprising that in a lockdown for such a long period of time that you’re going to have these sort of reductions. It does skew it.”

But not all types of crime fell.

“The top two were breaches of CHO (orders) and family violence orders,” Mr Nugent said.

There were 32,561 fines for breaches of the Chief Health Officer’s directions issued in the 12 months to the end of June.

Family violence order breaches rose by 22.1 per cent.

Sex offences against children also rose by 44 per cent.

“That’s largely attributed to the work of our joint anti-child exploitation team,” Mr Nugent said.

Press PLAY below to hear more from Deputy Commissioner Nugent on the crime statistics

Press PLAY below for Heidi Murphy’s rundown of the crime data