Municipal police officers patrol in a street of Sceaux during nationwide confinement measures to counter the Covid-19, in Sceaux, south of Paris, Wednesday, April 8, 2020.
Recorded cases of thefts, sexual violence and burglaries have fallen across France since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, official statistics show.
The latest set of weekly delinquency figures released on Thursday by the Ministry of Interior also shows that crime figures rose last week as the country prepared to ease lockdown restrictions first introduced on March 17.
The most noticeable decline pertained to non-violent thefts on people with some 4,000 victims identified last week, down from 12,000 during the same week in 2019 and nearly 14,000 in the first week of March.
Thefts involving vehicles have meanwhile more than halved since the beginning of March to reach 4,500 last week. Law enforcement noted, however, that this represented a “significant” rise from the previous week when fewer than 4,000 instances had been recorded.
The number of victims of sexual violence, which was higher in the first week of March compared to the same period in 2019, has since fallen below last year’s tally. Last week, law enforcement counted 550 victims (-350 year-on-year).
Cases of violent thefts on people and burglaries have also dropped significantly year-on-year, falling by 1,100 and 2,400 respectively although the later one increased slightly from the previous week.
