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The term 'capital punishment' is derived from the Latin caput, meaning 'head'. It originally referred to death by decapitation, but now applies generally to state sanctioned executions. Some Middle East countries still practise decapitation for certain offences, but more common forms of the death penalty include electrocution, gas, firing squad, lethal injection and hanging.¹

Foreword | In recent years, the Australian Government has committed significant resources to combating trafficking in persons. Within this larger anti-trafficking effort, the community sector, law enforcement, prosecutors, health professionals and members of the community all have an important role to play. As each sector comes to terms with the reality of trafficking in Australia, it is important that emerging challenges and possible solutions are identified.

Foreword | With the ageing of the population, and increasing demand for individuals to be financially literate and self-sufficient, older Australians may find themselves at greater risk of fraud. Although the proportion of the elderly experiencing fraud is lower than for those aged less than 65 years, this is the crime they are most likely to experience and the effects can be devastating as the elderly are often not able to recoup the losses.

Foreword | Adolescent antisocial behaviour is an issue of major concern to parents, teachers, police and governments and is a significant cost to the community. As not all antisocial behaviour is recorded by police, it is valuable to measure adolescents' own reports of their involvement in such behaviour.

There has been considerable growth in the use of closed circuit television (CCTV) in public spaces as a crime prevention measure and, increasingly, as a tool to detect and identify offenders. In Australia, CCTV systems have become an increasingly common fixture in urban centres, in shopping centres and malls, individual shops and banks, on public transport and in car parks.

Early intervention aims to reduce risk factors and enhance protective factors that impact on the likelihood that a young person will engage in offending behaviour. As a crime prevention strategy, it is based on the premise that intervening early in a young person's development can produce significant long term personal, social and economic benefits.

Victoria Police’s Vehicle Crime Squad (VCS) Second-Hand Dealer Inspection and Closure program today received a bronze award in the police-led category of the 2021 Australian Crime and Violence Prevention Awards (ACVPA).

The ACVPA recognise best practice in the prevention or reduction of violence and other types of crime in Australia and play a vital role in highlighting effective community-based initiatives to prevent crime and violence.

The British Reducing Burglary Initiative (RBI) was evaluated several times in its four year life. CRM No.31 presented the findings of one of these reviews (Kodz & Pease 2003). In a separate study of the RBI, Hope et al. (2004) used a time-series methodology to examine what proportion of the reduction in burglary was directly attributable to the RBI initiative, isolated from all other factors. This supplementary research found that while burglary rates generally declined, this could be attributed to the independent effect of the RBI in only six of the 20 targeted areas.

Abstract

There are two reports in this volume. They are divided into sections, as follows:

Australian Institute of Criminology

Year in review

The Chair of the Board of Management and the Director of the Institute review the significant issues and achievements for the year, provide a snapshot of performance and highlight expected developments for the coming year.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics' annual publication Recorded crime, victims, Australia presents national crime statistics on victims of selected offences recorded by police. The figure below shows the trends in victims of armed and unarmed robbery between 1993 and 2005. Robbery is defined as the unlawful taking of property from the immediate possession of a person or organisation, accompanied by the use, or threatened use, of force. Armed robbery includes instances where a weapon was used, or its use threatened.

Foreword | Corruption in Australian sport is not a new phenomenon. A series of high-profile cases in Australia, combined with an increasing international focus, has seen a reassessment of Australian sport’s vulnerability to illegal activities such as match-fixing, use of inside information for betting purposes and the use of performance and image-enhancing drugs.

What is graffiti?

Graffiti refers to the act of marking property with writing, symbols or graphics (Weisel 2002; White 2001). For the purpose of this paper, graffiti is defined as the marking of other people's property without their consent. In this context, graffiti is illegal and in Australia it is a persistent problem that attracts a variety of penalties.

What is antisocial behaviour?

Foreword | This paper examines the current evidence of the cost, extent of and awareness of consumer fraud in Australia. In 2008, the ABS found that approximately five percent of the Australian population reported being victimised by consumer scams, with personal losses reaching almost $1b. This paper compares the findings of the ABS survey with those gathered by the AIC during the annual fraud awareness-raising activities conducted by the Australasian Consumer Fraud Taskforce.