Grand Ducal police recorded 38,537 criminal violations in Luxembourg in 2016, a fall of 4.5% on 2015, and the lowest level seen for the last four years.
Luxembourg’s crime rate per 100,000 inhabitants has thus fallen 6.7% according to the figures presented yesterday by Luxembourg’s deputy prime minister and minister of homeland security, Étienne Schneider, and the Deputy Director General of the Grand-Ducal Police, Donat Donven.
However, the Deputy Director-General of the Grand-Ducal Police has called for a careful reading of the statistics, which are mostly a tool for police to identify the main trends in delinquency.
Property offences accounted for the majority of cases (22,306), accounting for 57.9% of reported crimes.
With 3,205 cases, burglary overall, including attempted burglary which accounted for 41% of reports, fell by 403 incidents on the year before. Burglaries in populated areas fell by 573 cases, equivalent to a drop of 21.25%. More than one third of burglaries were attempts.
In 2016, eight armed robberies were carried out in Luxembourg. Two were hold-ups on gas stations and six against other businesses and establishments.
242 vehicles were stolen in 2016.
Offences against the person, 21.4% of reported crimes, fell slightly by 1.17%. This category includes, among other things, acts of wilful killing, assault, domestic violence, rebellions and outrages against agents, rape and indecent assault, threats, defamation, slander and abuse.
Voluntary assault, which was continuously on the rise until 2014, has since followed a declining trend with a 2016 decrease of 3% from 2015.
The fight against narcotics constitutes, alongside the fight against burglary, the second highest priority of the Grand Ducal police.
Prevention, field presence and investigations characterise the work of the police in this area. In total, police detected 3,981 cases of narcotics use, possession and trafficking in 2016, a decrease of 14.84% compared to 2015.
The number of cases for drug trafficking increased from 203 in 2015 to 274 in 2016. Indeed, police work is mainly aimed at traffickers and less on consumers.
The police resolved 47% of cases, a slight increase from 2015’s clearance rate of 45%. Clearance is counted by the police if police work allowed the identification of at least one suspicious person.
At the presentation, the Minister of Homeland Security welcomed the overall crime reduction of 4.5% and the work of the police. He also noted that the 25% reduction in the number of burglaries in the last two years is a positive result and demonstrates that on the ground police efforts have paid off. Nevertheless, the minister added that "even if the figures indicate that we are moving in the right direction, we must continue our efforts in all areas.”
The Minister further stressed that the clearance rate remains too low, though that this is largely due to the fact that burglaries committed by mobile bands traveling across the European Union are difficult to investigate. The Minister therefore announced Luxembourg's future participation within the organised crime framework of the common European actions coordinated by Europol to counter this problem.
