Police say 79% of crimes as of September considered solved

THE Philippine National Police (PNP) said eight of 10 crime incidents in the country were solved in the past nine months.

Citing crime analysis data of the PNP Directorate for Investigation and Detective Management, PNP spokesperson Colonel Ysmael Yu said 79.6 percent of crime incidents from January to September 2020 were declared as solved by the PNP.

This means that suspects were identified and arrested and charges against them were filed.

Yu also said the total number of crime incidents during the said period went down by 23.9 percent compared to the crime incidents in the same period in 2019.

From January to September 2020, 89,072 crime incidents were recorded while there were 372,621 incidents recorded in the same period of 2019.

He said the peace and order index crimes went down by 21,623 or 10.79 percent to 178,751 from 200,374 in the period under review.

The peace and order index is made up of 147,976 non-index crimes comprising 82.78 percent and 30,775 or 17.22 percent index crimes.

Yu noted that focus crimes posted double-digit declines with theft and robbery posting the biggest decline at 51.03 percent and 47.52 percent, respectively.

Other focus crimes are murder, homicide, physical injury, rape, carnapping of motor vehicle and carnapping of motorcycle and special complex crimes of robbery with homicide, robbery with rape, robbery with serious physical injury, robbery with arson, rape with homicide, kidnapping with homicide, kidnapping with rape and arson with homicide.

Yu said focus crimes decreased nationwide: in Luzon by 38.13 percent; in Visayas by 47.58 percent; and in Mindanao by 37.49 percent.

“These nine-month data reflects a downward trend that indicates much improved peace and order situation towards the remaining months of year 2020,” Yu said in a statement.

“These data were collated from police blotters of 17 police regional offices across the country to come up with a comprehensive and accurate picture of the nationwide crime environment,” he added. (Third Anne Peralta-Malonzo/SunStar Philippines)