Trend analysis of violent crimes incidents in Malaysia,

2004-2013

Prepared by;
1) RAJIV A/L RAJA RATNAM (08DKM12F2099)
2) KESAVAN A/L BERNABAS (08DKM13F1047)
3) NAVINDRAN A/L SELVOM (08DKM13F1043)

INTRODUCTION

A violent crime or crime of violence is a crime in which an offender uses or threatens force upon a
victim. This entails both crimes in which the violent act is the objective, such as murder, as well as
crimes in which violence is the means to an end. Violent crime generally includes crimes of
violence that are sufficiently regular and significant in occurrence. The types of violent crime are:
murder, gang robbery with firearm, gang robbery without firearm, robbery with firearm, robbery
without firearm, rape and lastly voluntarily causing hurt. There are many causes of violent crimes
happening in Malaysia. Poverty is one of the causes that lead to crime events such as armed
robberies and murders. Individuals in this category commit crime because they are desperate of
basic needs such as house, healthcare, education and employment. The second cause is family
background. Bad family background can be the cause for crime in Malaysia because it can give
bad influences for their children and cause them to turn out to be offenders in the future. The lack
of parent loves in family, such as single parent, gives bad influences. Besides that, the home
violence gives also the bad influences for children because conflict between parent will hurt their
children emotionally and cause them to lose trust on their parent. So parent should have good
responsible and great altitude in family in order to provide good family background for their
children, so as to prevent them from becoming offenders that involve in crimes. The third cause is
peer influences. One of the strongest and robust correlates to crime and delinquency is
associating with delinquent peers. Youth at puberty tend to have the desire to grow older and get
mature by imitating other slightly older youths who committed crimes. Youth with delinquent friends
showed criminal behaviour. Involvement with gang members is the most serious level of peer
influence. Therefore, its obvious that peer influences play an important part too in contributing to
the increase of armed robberies and murders in Malaysia. These are the causes of violent crime
incidents in Malaysia. This paper will display/discuss the trend analysis of violent crimes incidents
in Malaysia, 2004-2013.

TABLE 1

Year

Number of Incidents

2004

21767

2005

22039

2006

31408

2007

35159

2008

37817

2009

42365

2010

34133

2011

30622

2012

29950

2013

29375

Trend analysis of violent crimes incidents in Malaysia, 2004-2013

45000
40000
35000
30000
25000
Number of Incidents

Number of Incidents 20000

15000
10000
5000
0

Year

Figure 1

Official statistics were obtained from the Crime Investigation Department, Royal Malaysia Police
(RMP, 2014)

TRENDS

The trend analysis of violent crimes between 2004 and 2013 is shown in Figure 1 below. The ten
year (2004-2013) archival analysis showed that a total number of 314,675 violent crime incidents
were recorded throughout Malaysia. In general, violent crimes occurred in a fluctuating pattern
(RMP, 2014). The highest number of violent crime incidents were recorded in the year 2009
(42,365 cases) followed by the year 2008 (35,159 cases).

There was an increase in the number of recorded violent crime incidents from 2004 to 2009
(20,598 incidents or 94.6%). Violent crime incidents steadily decreased after the year 2009. There
was a decrease in 575 reported cases between the years 2012 and 2013.

However, it must be noted that a sizeable proportion of crimes goes unreported and thus
unrecorded as part of the index crime. Research showed that the decision to report a crime
depends upon a whole range of factors, such as the place where it was perpetrated, the identity of
the offender and whether it was thought appropriate to report to the police. These unreported
crimes reflect the dark figures of crime. Thus, the actual number of violence in Malaysia is
estimated to be much higher.

CONCLUSION

These archival analyses offer a better understanding on the epidemiology of violent crimes in
Malaysia. The information from the analyses could be used to characterize violent crime incidents
and types of violent crimes that appears to becoming more and more prevalent in Malaysia. The
present epidemiological knowledge derived from this study is considered vital elements to criminal
justice figures in order to implement sustainable solutions and risk-focused crime preventions.
Therefore, it is anticipated that the present study would be of benefit in addressing the nature of
violent crime in Malaysia which is parallel to the aim of Malaysias National Key Result Area in
reducing crime.