Crime in the country has risen steeply by 18% compared to previous years, this is according to the annual Police report released on Wednesday.
“In 2022, we note that there was an 18% increase in the number of crimes reported to Police from 196,081 cases reported in 2021 to 231,653 cases mainly due to the full opening of the economy after the Covid-19 lockdown and growing confidence to report crime to Police,” said the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Martin Okoth Ochola.
Ochola explained that out of the total cases reported to Police in 2022, 68,405 cases were taken to Court, 26,749 cases were not proceeded with, while 136,499 cases were still under inquiry.
“This was an improvement compared to 2021 where 65,008 cases were taken to Court, 60,095 cases not proceeded with and 70,978 cases under inquiries. This reflects a great improvement in cases taken to Court by 5.2%.”
The report indicates that domestic violence cases increased by 1% to 17698 from 17533 reported in 2021 whereas cases of breakings have shot up by 36% to 13826 from 10,148 in the previous year.
Child related offences have recorded the biggest increase in the number of cases committed and reported to police after going up by 55% from 8681 to 13489.
Robbery cases rose up in 2022 by 30% from 5275 to 6854 whereas homicides rose up by 3% to 4043 from 3912 reported the previous year, 2021.
The report indicates that sex related offences have gradually reduced by at least 10% to 14693 from the 16373 reported the previous year.
The same report indicates that defilements went down by 38% from 14436 in 2021 to 8960 in 2022.
The year 2022 saw an unprecedented number of attacks on security personnel, mostly police officers by assailants for guns.
The report indicates there were 32 such cases in which 38 guns and 705 ammunition were robbed.
However, the report says 30 of these guns and 545 ammunitions have since been recovered.
The Police Crime Intelligence Directorate headed by AIGP Brig Christopher Ddamulira last year launched sting operations to crackdown on assailants who were targeting security personnel and installations in the country.
The attacks became more pronounced following the attack by a group of assailants at Busiika Police station in which three police officers were killed and several guns stolen.
The resultant operations led to the arrest over 10 suspects as security bust the gang linked to ADF that target police officers and other security installations.
