Talk:Crime in New Zealand

Needs complete rewrite
I tried to get the intro readable at least, but it's hard to improve it any further given the standard of the rest of the article.--Gueux de mer (talk) 08:43, 15 February 2019 (UTC)
 * I agree that a rewrite is needed. However, I think that launching into the second paragraph of the introduction with the latest crime statistics from Police merely perpetuates the very issued that the editorial notice is warning against. There is a particular point of view that the Police statistics actually tell us anything significant about the prevalence of Crime in New Zealand, rather than how efficiently Police are managing the crime that has been reported to them. A far more balanced second paragraph would cite the Salvation Army's "State of the Nation" report, released earlier in the week, where they identify that crime statistics are hard to come by as only a quarter of criminal offending is ever reported to Police and only half of that appears in the Police statistics. The benefit of doing that is that is the document is a secondary source, rather than being a primary source that the Police statistics are. When I look back through the article history it seems that there was a whole lot of potentially good stuff that has been contributed to the article over time, but has been cut out or removed due to unthinking editors with a lack of subject knowledge making poor quality contributions, as well as rampant vandalism and bold copy-editing that now looks like radical surgery, because nobody thought to discuss this article before editing it. So here is what I think should happen. The introductory first paragraph should remain as the lead. The second and third paragraphs should go into the body, along with the graph and the other text that was previously there. The editorial note can probably move with it, to be a section note, as it is that text that is the main problem. Then we flesh out the article based on the plan below. - 210.86.82.145 (talk) 12:15, 15 February 2019 (UTC)

Article plan
This article is rated as a high importance New Zealand article. However, at the start of 2019 this article is turning into a mess as it is poorly structured, with no thought being given to what it should contain or how it should be structured. The article lead talks about measuring crime statistics but says nothing about the crime being counted. Shouldn't it be the other way around? Or should the page become Crime statistics in New Zealand? Anyway, below is a straw-man for the broad subject areas I think should be covered; feel free to modify as you think fit. - 210.86.82.145 (talk) 06:41, 3 February 2019 (UTC)

Plan for Crime in New Zealand article

 * Lead section : Summary of article. Anything mentioned in this section needs to be in the rest of the article.
 * Introductory section (Basis for New Zealand criminal law) : Provides an Overview or Background about what constitutes Crime in New Zealand, its basic principles, how it has evolved from common law and English law, and codification by the New Zealand Parliament, how it is administered in the New Zealand Courts, enforced by enforcement agencies and how offenders and victims a dealt with in general terms. Cover things like standards of proof, the jury system, trials and appeals, etc. Perhaps introduce various concepts and terms such as jurisdiction, an offence, a crime, offender, victim, suspect, charge, arrest, conviction, sentence, imprisonment, appeal, infringement, fine, adult, young person, minor, child, etc. either here or later in the article as and where they become relevant.
 * Types of Crime section : Provide an overview what types or classes of crime exist in New Zealand law, who has jurisdiction to prosecute crime or administer the law for particular types of crime or offences, especially if it is not Police. Distinction between criminal and civil law. Perhaps cover significant legislation defining crime, such as the Crimes Act 1961.
 * Enforcement by enforcement agencies : Explain role of Police, as well as other agencies able to enforce crime, in more depth.
 * Judicial procedure in and out of Courts and Tribunals : Explain role of Trials and Hearings held in Courts and Tribunals. Also cover less formal judicial procedures such as Family Group Conferences, Restorative Justice panels, first time offender diversion, Police warnings and cautions as well as infringements and Police Safety Orders.
 * Punishment and Imprisonment : Discuss how Corrections implement Court sentences including administering terms of Imprisonment, community service, home detention, parole and release of offenders. Also discuss how Courts administer fines collection and victims rights.
 * Offender and Victim Rights and support available : Discuss (a)Offender's right to a fair trial, legal aid, representation and evidence, (b)Victim's rights to be informed about how the offender is being dealt with, victim impact statements, notification of parole hearings and release from prison.
 * Systemic bias and/or over-representation of Males, Youth, Maori : Discuss systemic bias and over-representation of Males, Youth, Maori and other ethnic groups that are disproportionately over- or under-represented, underlying causes as well as interventions intended to reduce or mitigate over-representation.
 * Statistical sources and open data : Identify and discuss various sources of crime related statistics. Discuss how crime is counted, reported, recorded, classified, at various stages of the criminal justice process from victimisation through to imprisonment and reoffending. Cover dark crime that is never reported to Police and reasons why people do not report. Also discuss which types of crime are well reported and which are not. Also discuss issues with crime statistics, such as mis-classification and manipulation of statistics, changes in statistical data collections. Comparisons with other countries, particularly Australia, Canada, UK and USA. Identify open data sources of crime related data, but avoid including tables of statistics unless absolutely necessary to prove a point, because these statistics need updating continually.
 * Notable crimes that changed the law, policy or organisations : Provide a short list of New Zealand's most notable and significant crimes that had ongoing implications for the justice system, exposed improper behaviour of officials, lead to a change in the law, policy or development of crime prevention programmes. These could include mass homicides such as Aromoana, Bain, Crewe, Dean, Graham or individual crime victims such as Elliott and Nicholas. Limit the list to between half a dozen and a dozen notable historic crimes. No crimes to be added or removed without discussion and justification for their inclusion. Create a separate list article of notable New Zealand crimes and criminals that indexes all the crimes, criminals and victims articles that meet the notability test and have survived any AfD process.
 * International and trans-national crime interaction, co-operation and comparisons : Cover things like mutual assistance, Interpol, UN treaties, International Law, Extraditions, Transnational Organised Crime and enforcement, and comparison of crime in New Zealand with other countries.
 * References and Supporting resources : Citations, footnotes and links to other Wikipedia articles and external websites.


 * This looks like a great plan! My only suggestion is that there should be something about Māori traditional law Philipp.governale (talk) 06:16, 13 September 2020 (UTC)


 * I also think it would be good to have a section on the major changes in the law (ie legalisation of abortion, decriminalisation of gay unions etc), but one would need to be quite selective and only pick the most significant changes (whatever people may think they are) Philipp.governale (talk) 14:25, 13 September 2020 (UTC)


 * The purpose of this section would be to outline how the response to crime has changed (which I think is an important discussion in a page about crime) and to also discuss how what constitutes crime has changed in New Zealand. . In terms of major legislative changes affecting I am thinking of the decriminalisation of gay and lesbian relationships, the decriminalisation of abortions and prostitution law reform. In terms of sentencing laws, I would primarily integrate the current information about death penalty abolishment and perhaps there could be also something about the three strikes law and the Sentencing Act 2002, but I am not knowledgable enough in this area to know whether they would meet the threshold of significance. Any thoughts? Philipp.governale (talk) 05:16, 14 September 2020 (UTC)

Criteria for including specific crimes and criminals
There is a list of "Notable crimes and criminals". If this is to be kept (rather than relying on categories), it would be good to have criteria for what should be included. All crimes and criminals that have articles are notable (in theory) but the list should be reserved for particularly notable ones, with the rest accessible via categories. Obviously mass murders would be in. I think that particularly controversial cases should be included. I can think of a couple of controversial who-done-it double murders that are not included. On the other hand some of the 21st century ones are single homicides, while horrific, not especially controversial - this is just recentism, in my opinion. Perhaps it should be required that each entry have a brief phrase that indicates why it is particularly notable - if we can't come up with such a justification, leave the entry out. Or should we delete the list and rely on categories? Thoughts? Nurg (talk) 05:37, 15 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Hmm... Notable? Controversial? Horrific? I think WP has to rely on column inches, number of refs etc to determine what to include in the list and what to leave for the categories. What is a reasonable number of crimes to have listed here? Maybe 10-15? -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 06:45, 15 April 2012 (UTC)


 * An alternative would be to split it off into something like List of New Zealand crimes and criminals, and allow the inclusion of everything for which there is an article. Nurg (talk) 07:55, 15 April 2012 (UTC)


 * Personally I am not too keen on those sort of lists but they seem to be created all too readily. A higher priority is developing prose in the Crime in New Zealand article itself but I am no expert on the subject since I am an angel... -- Alan Liefting (talk - contribs) 08:24, 15 April 2012 (UTC)

The list is of very little use. Now that I have added significantly to the prose, I propose to delete the entire list. Any objections?Offender9000 (talk) 22:06, 1 September 2012 (UTC)


 * Perhaps a bit too much water has gone under the bridge now for an objection to be worthwhile, but the removing the aforementioned list and turning it into prose by the above, now blocked, editor has resulted in a bit of unintended(?) vandalism after his contributions were later removed. I think there is a need to mention some notable crimes in this article, but I would be quite selective about it with somewhere between 3 and 7 notable crimes listed that are significant in terms of the criminal law and justice system. Not only should the crime, itself, be notable but the crime should also be related to subsequent events that have notable consequences that affect Crime in New Zealand. Before including the crime in the list a connection needs to be drawn between the two events. For example:
 * The Aramoana massacre lead to a change in the Arms Act 1983 that significantly tightened the regulation of firearms in New Zealand.
 * Parliament removed the defence of provocation from the Crimes Act after Clayton Weatherston used it to justify his murder of Sophie Elliott. The same crime resulted in an education program being established to teach young people about recognising intimate partner violence.
 * The conviction of Minnie Dean for the murder of several children was followed by changes in the law concerning child abuse.
 * For other articles on Wikipedia, perhaps there should be a List of New Zealand crimes and criminals or perhaps a category. - 210.86.82.145 (talk) 04:17, 16 February 2019 (UTC)

Legislation and sentencing
This section seems to include material which discusses a number of ideas that were proposed by political parties - but were never followed through on. Therefore are irrelevant to this article.

There is also evidence of editorialising in this section. After checking the references provided for some of the sentences, there are claims made that are not supported, plus the fact that the system was 'changed' rather than scrapped isn't described. There are also clear cases of choosing of supporting material to push one point of view - e.g. a whole paragraph focusing on the problems with new legalisation etc. I have removed this material. Clarke43 (talk) 20:51, 8 June 2013 (UTC)


 * You deleted material attributed to former Law Professor and Prime Minister, Sir Geoffrey Palmer. His views on sentencing are highly relevent.JaggerAgain (talk) 21:02, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

I did. Because they are being used to support one POV. This article is effectively a Coat-rack style article. His is one view on legislation - nothing about sentencing, hence why it can go. Clarke43 (talk) 21:07, 8 June 2013 (UTC)

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Crime statistics
Since July 2014, Police have been publish monthly statistical data as on-line open data about offender proceedings and victimisations, rather than publishing recorded offence statistics in formal reports. The different statistical collections are not comparable and interpreting them, especially across the transition period, probably constitutes original research. Rather than creating statistical tables in Wikipedia, the article will need to refer readers to the sources of this open data, which can be found at policedata.nz, instead of being found in a published report with commentary and analysis that can be quoted. For commentary, editors will need to find separate sources where crime trends have been interpreted, such as crime statistics publications from the Police, news media reports, briefing papers or fact sheets that are publicly available. Meanwhile, the existing tables cannot be updated as the statistical collection has been retired, so should they probably be removed because they will become more misleading as they get more out of date. - 210.86.82.145 (talk) 04:37, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

Crime rates
The crime rates per 10,000 population in the statistical tables headed "New Zealand recorded crime rates, 1994–2014 calendar years" and "New Zealand recorded crime statistics for years ending 31 December 2012–14, by ANZSOC category" have been computed by combining population estimates from a Statistics New Zealand population source with Crime counts from Police data published in a different source by Statistics New Zealand. From reading the Manual of Style, I understand that performing the rate calculation is probably improper synthesis that constitutes original research, because information from 2 different sources has been combined to produce something new that does not appear in either source.

The Police data source report for the second table, New Zealand Crime Statistics 2014, has its own set of population estimates on page 24 and these differ from the cited Statistics New Zealand population source by about 500 or so for each year. There is also a separate population table that accompanies the New Zealand recorded crime rates data from Statistics New Zealand, but you have to read through the accompanying, and now archived, table metadata and usage instructions to find it and use it.

The first table can be salvaged by changing the source to be the same as the second table and using the data on pages 13 and 24, but this requires omitting the years 1994 and 1995 and enlarging the crime rate figures to have one decimal place. The second table can be salvaged by omitting the year 2012 and reducing the crime rate figures to only one decimal place, as the rates for 2013 and 2014 are published in the tables on pages 6 to 11 with one decimal place. That would mean no calculations need be performed and there is no copyright violation because the tables are formatted differently, but with the same facts.

However, in the long run it is questionable if having these 2 tables really add value to the article. These table are produced from statistical collections that were retired after they were published in April 2015. They were replaced by monthly victim and offender statistics that are not comparable with the historic collections. This means any new statistical tables will need to rely on sources that analyse the new statistics. So far, nobody seems to be producing any overall analysis of these new statistical collections, as Police have stopped publishing their crime statistics reports and now just publish the open data on-line, so anyone can download and analyse it. In order to replicate these tables in the future some one is going to have to do the research and analysis to produce the equivalent tables.

But would performing calculations like that, by using the raw data as a basis for additional calculations, be considered original research - especially if done by a Wikipedia editor exclusively for this article? And would any analysis of the data, like describing any increases or decreases, be original research as that would be interpreting the data, rather than just reporting the analysis by an independent source ? What if the analysis was inappropriately interpreted, because of a lack of knowledge of what issues has affected the data? - 210.86.82.145 (talk) 11:23, 2 February 2019 (UTC)

There is a difference between Reported and Recorded Crime Statistics
There is an important difference between Reported and Recorded Crime Statistics. Up until 2014, NZ Police published Recorded Crime Statistics which are counted after after Police have investigated a report of crime and determined one had occurred. The crime is counted on the day it occurs. If crime is reported more than 14 days after the end of the counting period it is not counted. From 2014, Police have counted Recorded Crime in their statistics, which means all reports of crime are counted based on the day they are reported to Police, this means crime reports that Police discount as "No Crime" are still counted in the statistical collections but are normally excluded from Victimisation or Recorded counts but can be seen in Demand reports. The report The transformation of NZ Police crime statistics: New measures and trends explains the statistical issues in more detail. While the report Data Recording and Quality Assurance gives details about the crime recording process. What this means is that calling New Zealand Police Crime Statistics Reported crime is not appropriate for statistics prior to July 2014. The official statistical documents all refer to Recorded crime (or offences). From July 2014, the statistics do not count "crime" instead they count people, such as victims victimised and offenders proceeded against, but these are counted based on the date of the event that caused recording, not the date the crime occurred. Police cannot count something that hasn't been reported to them or they haven't detected. Some victims surveys have suggested only a third of crime is reported to Police and only half of what is reported appears to be recorded as crime, especially prior to 2014. This under-reporting phenomenon is sometimes referred to as The Dark Figure of Crime. - Cameron Dewe (talk) 08:51, 20 February 2021 (UTC)

Crime before colonisation
Would crime before European colonisation be within the scope of this article? New Zealand as a country did not exist then, but of course the landmass and civilisation existed and the term 'New Zealand' is often used to refer to the landmass as opposed to the state. Any thoughts? - Philipp.governale (talk) 10:14, 6 March 2021 (UTC)

Copyright problem removed
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 * I take complete responsibility for the copyrighted material I added and would like to unreservedly apologise. I will make sure it doesn't happen again. As I see it, the copyrighted material has been removed and as such I don't see why it is necessary to roll back to a 2012 revision. Philipp.governale (talk) 22:13, 28 March 2021 (UTC)