Crime | Authorities concerned with rapid rise in some offenses

Secretary for Security Wong Sio Chak

Despite a general stabilization in the growth of crime in Macau, reporting a mere 0.5 percent increase in 2018, both the authorities and society at large are concerned about a rapid rise in reports of specific offenses, revealed the Secretariat for Security at a presentation yesterday.

The crime of child sexual abuse grew by 50 percent year-on- year to reach a total of 27 cases in 2018, juvenile delinquency saw year-on- year growth of 35.6 percent (61 cases), usury crimes hiked 26.8 percent and scams increased 31.3 percent to a total of 1,195 cases.

With particular regard to the increase in cases of child sex abuse and juvenile delinquency, the Secretary for Security Wong Sio Chak said, “these situations deserve consideration and attention from all of society.”

These problems need coordinated “urgent action in terms of interdepartmental cooperation, schools and parents and guardians in order to ascertain motives and reinforce information, communication and awareness […] in cooperation with prevention and resolution efforts.”

Questioned on the topic of scams, especially those involving illegal currency exchanges that have been making headlines and contributing to a significant portion of the 2018 scams growth, the Secretary noted that the authorities have been paying significant attention to the topic and have organized police operations to target this type of crime by disrupting syndicates.

“According to the statistics [for 2018] we conducted 913 operations that intercepted a total of 3,050 people. All of them were deported according to the law and 2,269 of them were forbidden from entering Macau for a period of one year,” Wong said.

In January alone this year, “we intercepted a total of 545 scammers, of which 411 were punished with a reentry ban in the region.” The Secretary affirmed that anti-scam activities would continue to be one of the main priorities of the Public Security Police Force in 2019.

On the other hand, the Secretary for Security emphasized a drop in violent crime which, according to statistics, fell 21.1 percent last year, primarily due to declines of 36.1 percent and 33.3 percent registered in cases of homicide and theft respectively.

Among the other offenses that registered declines in 2018 were cases of drug consumption, drug trafficking and providing assistance to illegal immigration, which dropped by 32 percent, 4.9 percent and 8.7 percent respectively.

Nonetheless, Wong affirmed that the authorities intend to continue addressing these crimes as priorities. “We need to consider that these are crimes that result in high profit, so the offenders are certainly going to risk it and produce serious problems to society,” he said.

Questioned about the huge difference between the number of cases opened by the police and categorized as domestic violence (105 cases) and the final number of cases reaching the courts (two cases), the Secretary noted that not all cases with signs of domestic violence turn out to involve it.

Wong noted that “the legal provisions are quite restrictive on the classification of crimes as ‘domestic violence’,” adding that many of the cases were “suspected domestic violence or early stage situations that could develop into domestic violence.”

The chief security official added that in cases with serious consequences, such as those resulting in severe injuries or death, the police always opt to categorize the case under the most serious offense framework.

Judiciary Police (PJ) director Sit Chong Meng added that most of the cases of suspected domestic violence that were later dropped were classified as situations involving threats or bodily harm. Sit supplemented Wong’s statement by explaining that, “in general the crime is classified as domestic violence so we can activate the mechanism of victim protection of the Social Welfare Bureau.”

“If the crime meets the conditions stated by the legal provisions, of course we would forward it [to the Public Prosecutions Office] as domestic violence.”

The PJ director also noted that the definition of this crime is quite restrictive. For example, a family relationship must exist between the victim and suspect and the maltreatment must involve physical, psychological or sexual harm since the legal interest concerns the “physical integrity” of the victim.