KUCHING: Commercial and narcotics crime numbers have increased in the first three months of 2022 compared to last year’s figures in the same period.
Acting Sarawak Police Commissioner Datuk Mancha Ata revealed this during the 215th Police Day celebration at Sarawak Police Contingent Headquarters (IPK) on Friday (March 25).
“In general, the crime situation in Sarawak is at a controlled level.
“From Jan 1 to March 19, a total of 799 index crime cases were reported this year. This shows a decline of 188 cases compared to last year’s figure of 987 cases in the same period.
“Although the three-month period at the beginning of this year showed a decrease, we will continue to try to reduce the index cases compared to last year with various plans and operations that have been planned to control crimes from occurring.”
Mancha said commercial crime cases from Jan 1 to March 20 this year were a total of 585, involving losses amounting to RM16.5mil.
This showed an increase of 126 cases and RM3.7mil in losses, compared to 459 cases involving losses amounting to RM12.8mil reported last year in the same period.
The continuous efforts of the Commercial Crime Investigation Department (CCID) had resulted in a total of 215 arrests this year.
He pointed out that a total of 375 individuals, including 15 cases from the previous year, were charged in court, involving a total of 330 investigation papers.
“Overall, there were a total of 585 investigation papers and 56.41 per cent of them were prosecuted.
“As for narcotics crime cases, the arrests in the supply category (drug dealers) had increased by 15.81 per cent, with a total of 161 arrests recorded from Jan 1 to February this year, compared to 161 arrests last year in the same period.
“For the possession category, the number of arrests also increased by 28.14 per cent – 428 arrests this year compared to 334 last year.
“The value of drug seizures increased by RM6.3mil compared to RM3.2mil for the same period last year.”
Aside from that, Mancha revealed that the number of road accidents from Jan 1 to March 20 this year also increased by 553 cases compared to the same period for the previous year.
Last year, the Traffic Police Department only recorded 2,909 accident cases whereas, the department recorded a total of 3,462 accident cases this year.
“The department has increased operations to 178 this year in the same period (Jan 1 to March 20), an increase of 19 operations compared to last year’s figure of 159.
“The total number of summonses issued also increased by 10,120 – 1,8654 summonses issued this year compared to 8,534 last year.”
