Thread by @BenjaminMillar

Anyone paying attention to the headlines would be acutely aware Victoria has been experiencing a rapidly escalating crime problem among #AfricanGangs in general and the Sudanese population in particular.

So I approached the Crime Statistics Agency (as anyone could if they so wished) for the most recent data on alleged offender country of origin, comparing 2016 to 2017.

You may the @CrimeStatsVic had to issue a ‘statistical clarification’ when a number of journalists and media outlets were using an incorrect figure that overstated by 40 per cent the offence rate of Sudanese-born alleged offenders
crimestatistics.vic.gov.au/media-centre/n…

They obliged my data request. It astonishingly reveals that the proportion of alleged offenders from Sudan astonishingly soared from 1.0 per cent in 2016 to an astonishing ... 1.0 per cent in 2017.

To be precise, this "massive" upsurge that has led to our current gang crisis is being driven by a grand total of (a seemingly very busy) 32 more alleged offenders from Sudan in 2017 than 2016 - up from 805 to 837.

The five highest birth nations of alleged offenders remains: Australia, New Zealand, India, the United Kingdom & Ireland, and Vietnam.

While we have devoted countless print inches and broadcast hours to this so-called #AfricanGangs crisis, at least 12 other countries of origin all recorded a higher rise in the total number of alleged offenders across 2017 than Sudan.

By far the largest recorded rise was among .... (envelope please) ... Australian-born offenders. Up by more than 1000 over the year, responsible for more than seven in ten alleged crimes (71.4%). So. Wonder what this all might actually be about then?

To put it a little more simply, you are at least 71 times more likely to be a victim of crime by an Australian-born than Sudanese-born offender in Victoria (59,738 vs 837).

This data is in many ways immensely problematic, but at least allows a year to year comparison painting a picture light years from the narrative we have been told over and over again, particular since the start of this year.

There are many real-world consequences for Sudanese-Australian and other African-Australian communities already settled in Melbourne, but it also creates a feedback loop whereby governments can make this kind of decision with little scrutiny theguardian.com/australia-news…