Youth crime down, 2000-plus busted as cops blitz entire state
Police have now nabbed thousands of youth crims and charged them with more than 6000 offences since widespread deployments across Queensland targeting youth crime.
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Police have nabbed 2093 youth crims and charged them with 6167 offences since widespread deployments across Queensland targeting youth crime.
Commissioner Steve Gollschewski announced the milestone after Taskforce Guardian reached 102 deployments including more than 20 to crime-plagued Townsville.
He said 252 adults had also been charged during the operations and 980 people had been diverted from the youth justice system since Taskforce Guardian began in May 2023.
Acting Assistant Commissioner Andrew Massingham, who heads the youth crime taskforce for the service, said there had been a 22 per cent decrease in youth offending in Townsville from January to September, compared to last year.
He said overall there had been a 6.3 per cent decrease in youth offending in Queensland.
Assistant Commissioner Massingham said there had been decreases in nine of the 15 police districts.
“A very important indicator to me is those numbers won’t mean anything to people continue to feel unsafe in their home environments or where they walk along in the streets in their local communities,” he said on Tuesday.
“It’s not so much the numbers for me, it’s about our high visibility presence with Guardian.
Assistant Commissioner Massingham. said police had a solid understanding of the worst offenders after the deployments.
He said serious repeat offender numbers had decreased almost 18 per cent since November last year to 388, which was about 100 less than this time last year.
Police have been tracking social media accounts of some of the youths who post their exploits online, bragging about cars they’ve stolen or crimes they have committed.
“Our digital intelligence team, which is the first in this nation, we are intercepting livestream images invariably on social media of children in stolen vehicles (and it is) is a very very key aspect to the way we deploy Guardian,” he said.
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