International Journal on Criminology Volume 3, Number 1, Spring 2015 | Page 52

What recent property crime trends in Western Europe tells us about the crime drop
economic crisis,” “the attraction of current gold and jewelry prices on thieves,” and “the
internationalization of crime.”
A simple test of the pertinence of a hypothesis for a trend is its calendar: it has
to match the calendar of the variations observed. The economic crisis of 2008, and in
particular one of its consequences, the rise in gold prices, are from this point of view
potential candidates to explain the rise in domestic burglary with forced entry starting in
2009.
The wording of the cause itself, expressing its “attraction” for “thieves,” refers to
the economic interest of stealing gold in a context of an increase in its value on the official
market, and especially on the stolen-goods market.
The hypothesis of the role played by gold in the rise in domestic burglary with
forced entry was supported, in December 2013, by the publication by the ONDRP of data
on the characteristics of home thefts and attempted thefts described by households that
declared themselves to have been victims during the Cadre de vie et sécurité surveys. The
data show that:
Considering only thefts of objects in the home itself (and not in dependencies)
described by the households concerned, it was measured that the proportion of
those who stated that jewelry had been stolen went from 54.4% in the 2007–2010
surveys to 66.4% in the 2011–2013 surveys. The following qualitative information
can be deduced: it is estimated that two times out of three, a theft with forced
entry, climbing, or fake keys in a dwelling involved jewelry among the stolen
objects (Perron-Bailly 2013, 5).
The first signs of the possible phenomenon of internationalization mentioned by
the Belgian police were observed in metropolitan France at the beginning of the period of
increase in the reported cases of cambriolages de locaux d’habitations principales. It relies
on data about the people suspected (mises en cause) 8 of crime by the French police forces
(Police or Gendarmerie):
Depending on the type of nonviolent crime, the comparative number of French and
foreign suspects changed between 2008 and 2009: either both numbers increased
or only the number of foreign suspects rose. For example, for motor-vehiclerelated
thefts, French suspects declined (−3% or −1,142 suspects) and the foreign
suspects rose by +6% (or +180 suspects). The proportion of foreign suspects, or
less than 9% in 2009, was nonetheless small, especially when compared to that
for other nonviolent thefts. When the number of French suspects for a type of
nonviolent theft grew over one year, the increase was higher for foreigners: for
cambriolages de locaux d’habitations principales, the percentage growth rates are
respectively +11.6% (+1,453 French suspects) and +28.5% (+574 foreign suspects).
As a result, the proportion of foreigners among the suspects of cambriolages de
8
Mise en cause is used for a person “who has been taken in for questioning and against whom facts
or serious information corroborating guilt have been gathered, proving his or her participation in the
commission of the crime.”
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