More burglars locked up

Burglars are being locked up more often and for longer stretches.

A Justice Ministry analysis of convictions and sentencing between 1991 and last year shows that last year 38 per cent of burglars were imprisoned - the highest percentage recorded in the decade.

Length of sentences increased throughout the 10 years, and burglars were imprisoned for nearly six months longer on average last year than in 1991.

Both the last National and the Labour-Alliance governments have sought to crack down on burglary.

The report also shows that the number of convictions for violent offences has been slowly decreasing since 1995.

But this trend followed a rapid rise between 1991 and 1995.

The 14,639 convictions for violent offences last year is the lowest recorded since 1993, but is still 53 per cent greater than the figure in 1991.

The analysis found that the number of prosecutions resulting in convictions had slowly decreased over the decade, but the report believes this is because of greater use of diversion by the police.

Violent offence prosecutions are the least likely to result in conviction (53 per cent) and traffic offence prosecutions are the most likely (80 per cent).

The study shows that 83 per cent of all those convicted were men. Europeans made up 47 per cent of convictions, Maori 42 per cent, Pacific Island people 9 per cent and other ethnicities 2 per cent.

A study of offences committed in 1995 shows that only a quarter of the people convicted in that year were first offenders. The others already averaged 12 convictions.

Of those convicted in 1995, 40 per cent were reconvicted within a year.

Of the violent offenders convicted in 1995, 44 per cent had been convicted of a previous violent offence, but most had been convicted of property and traffic offences.

In the two years after their 1995 conviction for violence, 21 per cent were reconvicted for a violence offence.

- NZPA