The Council has released Sentencing Snapshots for six violent offences sentenced in the County and Supreme Courts of Victoria.
The offences in this release are:
- armed robbery
- aggravated burglary
- causing serious injury intentionally
- causing serious injury recklessly
- causing injury intentionally
- causing injury recklessly.
The new Snapshots focus on sentencing trends in the five years to 30 June 2021. They present data on the type and length of sentences imposed for the principal offence (the most serious offence in a case).
The Snapshots now include citations for cases with the longest imprisonment sentence during the five years.
Sentencing Outcomes over the Five Years
For five of the six offences, the lowest annual number of cases sentenced was in 2020-21 (the exception was causing injury intentionally).
The lower number of cases sentenced was due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This caused delays in court proceedings from March 2020 and throughout 2020-21.
Over the five years, the percentage of people who were sentenced to imprisonment was highest for:
- aggravated burglary (90.7%)
- causing serious injury intentionally (85.5%)
- causing serious injury recklessly (83.7%).
Over the same period, the highest average prison sentence was in 2020-21 for two of the six offences:
- causing serious injury intentionally (6 years and 7 months)
- causing injury intentionally (2 years and 6 months).
The lowest average prison sentence was in 2020-21 for three of the six offences:
- armed robbery (2 years and 3 months)
- aggravated burglary (2 years and 10 months)
- causing injury recklessly (10 months).
Of the six offences, causing serious injury intentionally had the highest median principal imprisonment length (5 years and 6 months). The median for both armed robbery and aggravated burglary was 3 years.
The new Sentencing Snapshots are available for download from our website.
