NCJ Number
237559
Date Published
August 2011
Length
13 pages
Annotation
This report provides an overview of the incidence of offenses against the person committed on the New South Wales (NSW) rail system (Australia) in 2010 and between 2001 and 2010.
Abstract
The crimes of interest for this study were assaults, excluding domestic violence; theft from a person; robbery; sexual assault; and other sexual offenses. According to NSW police records these crimes on the NSW rail system are generally very low. On a typical weekday, the rate of personal crimes on trains was 0.3 incidents per 100,000 passenger journeys. Similarly, the rate of personal crimes on railway stations was 0.04 per 100,000 passenger interchanges. Not all stations have the same risk for crimes against the person. For stations where such offenses occurred, the risk varied from 0.02 per 100,000 interchanges at North Sydney station to 3.2 per 100,000 interchanges at Waratah station. Assault was the most recorded offense (49.5 percent of incidents), followed by theft from a person (30.2 percent of incidents), robbery (12.2 percent of incidents), "other" sexual offenses, and sexual assault (0.6 percent of incidents). The overall risk of victimization on weekdays was highest during the afternoon commuter period (3:00 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.) and lowest during the early morning travel period (2:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m.).The risk of victimization on weekends was highest in the evening (6:30 p.m. to 2:00 a.m.) and early morning (2:00 a.m. to 6:00 a.m.). 6 tables, 9 figures, 4 references, and appended supplementary tables