Number of criminal offences slides in 2021

A total of 478,600 offences against the Criminal Code were recorded by the police, customs and border guard in Finland in 2021, which is 64,900 cases (11.9 per cent) fewer than in 2020, according to Statistics Finland.

The number of total offences against property was 221,500, which is 13.6 per cent lower than in the year before.

Altogether, 33,800 assault offences were recorded, which is 1.4 per cent more than in the year before.

A majority of the reported offences and infractions are recorded by the police. During 2021, a total of 489,900 offences and infractions were recorded by the police, which is 27.6 per cent fewer than in 2020.

The number of offences against the Criminal Code recorded by the police was 472,900, which is 11.9 per cent fewer than in 2020.

Fines from automatic traffic control are updated into the police PATJA system with a delay of around 80 days, which has an effect on the number of traffic infractions in particular.

In 2021, a total of 5,300 offences were recorded by the customs and 2,000 offences by the border guard. Compared with 2020, the offences recorded by the customs decreased by 18.6 per cent and those recorded by the border guard declined by 31.2 per cent.

The number of offences against the Criminal Code recorded by the customs was 4,200 and by the border guard 1,400.

A total of 35,800 frauds (fraud, petty fraud, aggravated fraud; Criminal Code, Section 36, Paragraphs 1 to 3) were recorded, which is 5.1 per cent more than in the year before. The number of frauds appears to be growing after a few years of decline. The recorded number of aggravated frauds was around 1,900.

During 2021, means of payment frauds numbered 6,200, which is 1,200 cases (15.9 per cent) fewer than in the previous year. The number of aggravated means of payment frauds was 242.

The number of robberies reported was 1,909 which is 4.4 per cent fewer than in the year before. Of robberies, 443 were aggravated.

A total of 126,900 theft offences (theft, aggravated theft, petty theft) were reported, which is 12,200 cases (8.8 per cent) fewer than in 2020.

The number of aggravated thefts recorded was slightly over 2,100, which is down by 18.7 per cent from the year before.