Big drop in burglaries but assaults on increase

Date Published: 06-Oct-2011

By Dara Bradley

A sharp decline in city burglaries so far this year has helped crime rates to fall considerably, according to local Garda statistics.

However, there has been an almost doubling in the number of serious assaults this year, which Gardaí have described as a “worrying trend”.

Chief Superintendent Dónal Ó Cualáin told this week’s Galway City Joint Policing Committee meeting that there were 4,985 incidents of crime recorded in the city between January and the end of August this year. That is a reduction of almost 19% on the first eight months of the previous year.

However, Garda figures reveal there were 74 assaults causing harm in the city between January and the end of August this year. This is almost double, or a 95% increase, on the corresponding period last year. Minor assaults also increased – they are up 17% to 169 in that eight months period.

Burglaries on city homes were down 22%, to 307; and all categories of thefts also fell in the first eight months of this year.

Citing the successes in fighting burglary, Chief Supt Ó Cualáin said Galway City was “bucking the national trend regarding property crimes”.

Despite the spiral in the number of serious assaults, Chief Supt Ó Cualáin said there was not a ‘knife culture’ in the city, saying there was no “underlying trend” to the assaults and they were all single and unrelated incidents.

He said the increase was a worrying trend, but Galway Gardaí hadn’t come up with a reason to explain it.

He noted it was strange that assaults were on the rise but public order offences were down 22% to 795 incidents

Read more in today’s Galway City Tribune