Fourth Quarter 2022/2023 Crime Stats

At the Insurance Crime Bureaus 2023 Annual Conference hosted earlier this month, “The Increased Physicality Of Crime In South Africa” was one of the topics discussed by our Head of Non-Life Insurance Operations. The South African Police Service has published the latest crime statistics for the country, showing the crime levels over the fourth quarter of 2022/23, which covers January to March 2023, echoing our sentiments.

More worrying is that the increase in theft comes alongside yet another jump in contact crimes, including the most violent crimes – like murder, attempted murder and assault. Contact crimes, including sexual offences and robbery, made up the biggest crime category, with 164,206 cases reported between 1 January 2023 and 31 March 2023.

Put into a different context, there is one contact crime committed every 50 seconds of every day.

Public Private Partnerships and Information sharing remain the reasons for hope despite the state of crime and policing in South Africa. While we know that the current socio-economy has directly impacted crime levels, we will continue bringing together the collective resources of insurance companies, Financial Institutions, Law Enforcement Agencies and other Stakeholders to facilitate the detection, prevention and mitigation of insurance / financial crimes as well as assist in the prosecution of offenders and fraudsters through ongoing insurance fraud investigations.

VIEW THE POLICE RECORDED CRIME STATISTICS ON THE SAPS WEBSITE.