Where are the most crime-ridden areas of Townsville?

Crime has become a frequent challenge for Townsville residents, but which areas are the hardest hit according to the recent stats? Find out how your suburb fared.

KIRWAN and the Townsville CBD have been revealed as the most crime-affected parts of the city.

A Townsville Bulletin deep dive into the Queensland Police Service statistics show certain suburbs have been inundated with specific crimes in the past 12 months.

Kirwan has emerged as the most crime-affected suburb, only beaten by the Townsville CBD.

Kirwan experienced 2381 over the previous twelve months, while the CBD saw 2515, mostly good order offences.

Aitkenvale, Garbutt and Palm Island also ranked highly amongst the areas hit hardest by crime, with more than 1000 incidents recorded in each in the past twelve months.

In Kirwan, unlawful entry, assault and other theft related charges were the most common offences committed over the most recent twelve month period.

In Aitkenvale, theft and property crimes were the most common offences.

The statistics are similar to previous years, with the same offences prominent in 2021. .

Use our interactive table below to see how many incidents happened in your suburb over the last twelve months:

Numbers accurate as of May 19, 2022.

The types of crimes have remained similar to those seen in previous years, and some of the people victimised in those time-periods still don’t feel safe.

Business owner James Jensen’s Kirwan based business Australian Nutrition Centre, was hit by vandals during a particularly vicious break-and-enter.

His store was ransacked, with broken glass, cash and other items found around a sleeping intruder the next morning.

The inside of Mr Jensen’s Kirwan store, which was ransacked during a break-in.

“We haven’t had more break-ins,” Mr Jensen said.

“But to say we feel safe would be a lie. We see a lot of people loitering about. We’ve had to escort customers to their cars sometimes. Things are still concerning.”

Mr Jensen said he wasn’t sure what the solution to the situation was, but said you “couldn’t fault the work of the police”, adding officers were limited by resources available.

“If we could alert the police a little quicker or maybe there were increased patrols, that might go some way to helping,” he said.

“The rehab programs aren’t quite as effective as hoped.”

The CBD was overwhelmingly targeted by good order offences and drug offences, which James Cook University criminologist Dr Mark David Chong said was not surprising.

A heat-map of Townsville shows the far-reachign impacts of crime over the past twelve months.

“It’s probably right to suggest that the good order offences are strongly correlated to the heavy presence of night clubs, and the associated clubbing and high alcoholic consumption that goes on there,” Dr Chong said.

“Likewise, entertainment precincts are well-known to be ‘magnets’ for illicit drug taking. The same goes for assaults, particularly if those charged with these crimes were inebriated and/or high on illegal substances.”

Dr Chong said one crime that was likely under-reported in the city’s night-life were sexual offences.

Dr Amy Forbes with criminologist Dr Mark David Chong.

“(Sexual offences) often feature quite heavily in these circumstances, although usually, these crimes tend to be under-reported to the police,” he said.

Many of the crimes reported in Townsville’s suburban areas over the past twelve months were what Dr Chong described as ‘signal crimes’, offences which cause a disproportionate amount of fear and anxiety within the wider community.

“These types of offences would include domestic break and enters, assaults in neighbourhood streets, stealing of cars from driveways, and so on,” Dr Chong said.

“As such, even if there are relatively small numbers of these crimes occurring, they can still cause tremendous worry among the residents across the region, and not just in those affected neighbourhoods.

“This is because such offences tend to significantly undermine a person’s personal as well as familial sense of security and wellbeing, particularly when these crimes occur or can occur in areas that they consider to be their sanctuary, for example, their home or neighbourhood.”

One such incident that caused overwhelming outcry was the assault of Ana Bristowe-Lamb.

The elderly woman was violently assaulted by a young thief during a home invasion in a crime that both shocked and stunned the Townsville community.

Despite her injuries requiring hospitalisation, several stitches and a lengthy recovery, Ms Bristowe-Lamb’s compassionate response – calming the intruder down and almost hugging him.

“I suspect when he spotted me he softened the blow. I expected him to be more forceful but after he put down the crowbar,” Ms Bristowe-Lamb said at the time.

“He could have bashed me but he didn’t.”

Another of the intruders offered Ms Bristowe-Lamb a glass of water, while the original attacker instructed another accomplice to retrieve her phone and call an ambulance.

“When I see the news of other crimes in the city, it is disheartening. I try and search for what can be done, but I just don’t see one solution that we can use to fix this,” Ms Bristowe-Lamb said.

“You do have to let the past go. It was very scary at the time and there are times I still have flashbacks.”

Ms Bristowe-Lamb’s attack caused other residents to call for greater support for victims, which is something Ms Bristowe-Lamb has been offered, but is yet to take advantage of.

“I’ve been supported very well by the community in many ways.

“They helped me replace my doors and put new locks and lights on, but I haven’t gone to any meetings. I think I would like to, in order to maybe help the others that have experienced similar things.”

Another person Ms Bristowe-Lamb would like to sit down with is one of her attackers.

“Sometimes I do wonder. I’d like to ask the girl what kind of dreams she had as a kid. Somehow that dream has got lost.”

Originally published as Where are the most crime-ridden areas of Townsville?