Mixed results in the fight against crime and violence


Let us compare the number of crimes registered by the Executive Secretariat of the National Public Security System for the first quarter of each year since 2015.

From the first quarter of 2015 to the first of this year, the number of total crimes for a first quarter increased 26.97%, which is 3.73 times more than the country’s population grew.

However, during the first quarter of the current year, the lowest number of intentional homicides was recorded since the first of 2017, the lowest number of kidnappings, the second lowest number of robberies since the first of 2015, and the second lowest number of femicides since the first of 2019.

The last four years of the government of Enrique Peña Nieto were disastrous: the total number of crimes during the first quarter increased by 19.54 percent.

In the four years that have passed since the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador, the total number of crimes for a first quarter increased 4.54 percent.

But, certainly, during the first three months of this year the number of crimes that most impact society was reduced.

6,152 intentional homicides were committed in the first quarter of 2022, the lowest number recorded for a first quarter since the first of 2017, when 5,697 were committed.

The increase in the number of intentional homicides increased 81.78% during the last four years of Peña Nieto and, fortunately, it has decreased 15.45% during the first four years of AMLO.

As far as kidnappings are concerned, 150 were reported in the first quarter of this year, which is the lowest number for a first quarter in the last eight years; 65.16% less than in the first quarter of 2019, which with 421 was the worst of the period.

And speaking of total thefts, the number fell 20.57% in the first quarter of 2022 compared to the first quarter of 2019. Only in 2021 were fewer thefts recorded during a first quarter in the eight years analyzed here. The record was set in 2018, when 202,122 were registered.

Despite these undoubted good results, we should be concerned about the fact that for various crimes in the first three months of 2022, records were broken for a first quarter so far in the Q4 government.

When comparing the first quarter of 2019 with the first of this year, there is a very worrying increase in these crimes: fraud (42.76%), breach of trust (23.95%), extortion (9.42%), property damage (13.44 %), dispossession (14.84%), crimes against the family (32.62%), family violence (27.68%), gender violence in all its forms other than family violence (847.59%), corruption of minors (31.51%), human trafficking (82.76%), sexual abuse (28.08%), sexual harassment (104.28%), sexual harassment (55.39%), simple rape (15.94%), equated rape (110.15%).

Based on these uneven results, it is impossible to say that the fight against crime and violence in our country is being won so far.

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Eduardo Ruiz-Healy

Journalist and producer

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Opinionist, columnist, lecturer, media trainer, 35 years of experience in the media, microentrepreneur.



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