Lockdown no brake on Coast’s offending
THE Gold Coast is punching above its weight, but not in a good way.
A deep dive into Queensland crime statistics shows the Coast has the highest number of assault, stolen cars and traffic offences of any police district in Queensland.
From June 2, 2019 to June 1, 2020, the city had 3169 assaults – nearly 1000 more than any other police district – 2373 stolen car offences and 4027 traffic offences.
It also ranked highly in break and enters (4157), drug offences (7022) and robberies (278).
A further breakdown of Gold Coast suburb data over the past year revealed the city’s heart is responsible for a large proportion of the offences.
And coronavirus lockdowns have done nothing to curb crime, with numbers barely fluctuating when compared to the year before.
Gold Coast Chief Superintendent Mark Wheeler said a number of factors contributed to high assault figures.
They included socioeconomic issues, the city’s large party precinct and the police approach to domestic violence offences.
He said homelessness and youth crime continue to create significant crime issues across the Coast.
“A significant percentage of these instances (stolen cars) are recidivist offenders. Taskforce Latro and our Child Protection unit target juveniles’ involvement in this issue across the Coast, and there have been a number of arrests made.
“We also have juvenile justice teams who, in collaboration with our property crime team, respond to – and investigate – crime committed by youths.
“Crime and issues around homelessness is not simply addressed by one agency, it is a whole of Government, whole of community, whole of family issue. I know it’s an old saying, but we can’t arrest our way out of it, we need to get to the grassroots of the problem.”
The outer suburbs of the Coast also had large numbers of assaults, with the majority thought to be either related to domestic violence or neighbourhood disputes, break-ins and stolen cars.
The data also appears to back up the long-held thought that crime along tram and train lines is higher, with the likes of Coomera, Helensvale, Nerang, Robina and Varsity
Lakes and the nightlife areas of the Coast bearing the brunt of crime.
One of the Coast’s most affluent suburbs, Palm Beach, featured highly in a number of crime stats, particularly stolen cars and home break-ins.
The southern end of the Coast from Broadbeach south appears to have the fewest offences, also having the smaller population. Central Gold Coast from Broadbeach to Labrador, with the highest density of people, has the highest crime rates, while the northern Coast, with its growing population, has a growing crime rate, with more police flowing to the north, including to Coomera police station and the Pimpama Police station in the pipelines.
Supt Mark Wheeler said overall the city was a safe place to live, with more than 1000 cops working across the Coast.
“The Gold Coast is a very safe community, to not only live, work and visit, but also to do business,” he said.
“Unfortunately there will always be those who want to take the easy (way), commit offences, generally it will be for personal gain, sometimes in response to something,” Supt Wheeler said.
“We look at trends and hot spots on a daily basis, our crime mapping down to the street level … crime goes up and down, sometimes it will be concentrated in one area, it could be an offender or a group of offenders who have identified an easy target.”