The Guyana Police Force (GPF) said yesterday that as at the end of June this year there had been was a 9% increase in serious crimes in comparison to the same period last year.
The force also announced a massive 14% increase in murders with 79 people losing their lives as at the end of June, this year, compared with 69 in 2014. There has been one murder so far for this month.
According to a police press release, offences listed under “serious crime” include murder, robbery under arms, robbery with violence, robbery with aggravation, larceny from the person, break and enter and larceny, burglary, rape and kidnapping.
It was also revealed that a total of 207 reports of rape were recorded at the end of June 2015 in comparison with 119 for the same period in 2014, which represents a 74% increase.
Break and enter and larceny and burglaries have shown an overall increase of 9%.
The statistics indicate a decrease of 9% in armed robberies involving the use of firearms, while the numbers are similar in relation to robberies where instruments other than firearms were used by the perpetrators.
Further, at the end of June this year, 61 illegal firearms had been recovered by the police, comprising 1 sub-machine gun, 35 pistols, 14 revolvers, 4 shotguns, 6 rifles and 1 pen-gun.
“The GPF is continuing its efforts aimed at crime prevention through its police-community partnership programmes, along with social crime prevention interventions in the Policing Divisions, with special emphasis on empowering youths,” said the release.
During last month, the release said, there were 18 interventions supported by the religious community in the Cops and Faith Community Network, which deals with juvenile first offenders for minor crimes as a preemptive to the New Opportunity Corps.
Since the launch of the Cops and Faith Com-munity Network in September 2013 up to June 30, of this year there has been a total of 174 interventions and in all cases the young people involved were counselled by religious leaders and with the involvement of parents and guardians and even the victims where necessary, the majority of them were warned and sent away, the statement said.