KIDS RUN WILD

JUVENILE crime has jumped a concerning 60 per cent in 12 months in Toowoomba.

Police are scrambling to deal with not only the crime spike but also the reasons behind the surge.

Young offenders up to the age of 17 are behind the spike in stolen cars and property break-ins, official figures reveal, while stealing from cars has also increased.

The only other age bracket to experience an increase in offending is adults aged 30 to 34 across the Darling Downs district.

“We’ve seen a 60 per cent increase and that’s in the arrests,” Acting Superintendent Dave Isherwood said.

“We (police) are proactive but what that states to me is that we’re still getting our adult criminals but the big noticeable increase is in juvenile offending.”

The 60 per cent in juveniles caught for unlawful use of motor vehicles, 30 per cent increase in unlawful entry of premises, and 12 per cent increase in stealing from cars is somewhat reflective of an upward crime trend in the region.

It’s unclear if the pattern of offending is generational or learned behaviour, with researchers yet to determine what’s behind the surge in juvenile offending.

What is clear, however, is that offenders are not necessarily from Toowoomba with youths from surrounding districts including Ipswich, Moreton and Southwest Queensland behind the rising crime rates.

Children as young as 12 have been known to drive themselves to the city from remote western parts of the state.

“The police service, along with other government services, are focused on the change – changing attitudes through intervention,” Act. Supt. Isherwood said.

“We’ve got our cross border and cross district issues.

“The whole idea of juvenile crime is trying to get them to change the way they think and act whereas quite often when they hit adult (age), the chances of attitudinal change is probably gone.

“It is ingrained and learned behaviour.”

Community programs have achieved some success in combating juvenile crime, with detention considered a last resort by the courts.

Among them is restorative justice conferencing where a child offender meets with the victim of their crime in a program which has proven results in reducing the rate of re-offending.

“We are using restorative justice processes to reduce an over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children in the justice system by diverting children from court to restorative justice conferences,” the State Government site said.

Restorative justice is a success where causal issues are identified and tackled to prevent further offending, while youth incarceration offers a short-term solution.

“The bottom line is in the short term, the incarceration works but in the long term it’s not the answer to the issue,” Act. Supt. Isherwood said.

“If you incarcerate an offender, whether they are a juvenile or an adult who continually commits offences, it’s only common sense that while they are incarcerated the crime reduces.

“They revert to the ingrained behaviour (and) the challenge for us and other government agencies is to turn that around.”

Act. Supt. Isherwood said the majority of juvenile offending was opportunistic with property left unlocked.

“If it’s not locked, it’s not a matter of it, it’s when it will get hit,” he said.

❝ingrained It is and learned behaviour.

— Act. Supt. Dave Isherwood