Spain and Crime Rates: and how statistics are being used to mislead

When I first moved to Spain in the late 1980s, Madrid seemed like a paradise, free of violence. I remember thinking that it was amazing that you could stay out all night, and it was relatively safe.

Okay, there were certain areas in town where you knew that things could get a bit rough, but what city doesn't have those areas. There also existed a sort of "pickpocket" etiquette, where victims knew that if they went to the Post Office there was a good chance they'd find their purse or wallet, void of the cash. Pickpockets in those days after grabbing the cash, placed the items in mailboxes to be collected by postal workers. I remember once going to the Post Office, where a considerate thief had bent all of my credit cards so that they couldn't be used by anybody.

But little by little the perception of that "safe-ness" has been changing, to the point now in much of the press there has been spatterings of talk about rising crime rates, and usually linking that to immigration.

In fact, in several newspapers over this past year - perhaps as a result of France and Le Pen - there have been articles that usually read something like this: "XX% of all crimes are committed by foreigners." If that headline doesn't raise a few eyebrows, well it should, primarily because it doesn't put things in perspective. What is also needed is information on what percentage of the population is "foreign."

That said, there is no doubt that crime rates have risen, but realistic rates should also measure rises in population, and the percentage of foreigners. In other words, it does no good to say there were 1,000 more crimes committed this year than last. Instead, what is needed, is information how does that related to a percentage of the total population.

Another thing that skews any figures, are false reports. In Spain, for example, figures are often thrown out of whack by individuals who when traveling in the summer to the coast, place false claims to gain insurance money.

Still, where in the past when somebody robbed you there was little danger of physical violence, now there is a growing feeling of unease.

All of this to say, contrary to the "feeling" some people may have, Spain is still a relatively safe place to be. While the gentleman pickpockets may no longer be around, the truth of the matter is that Spain still has one of the lowest crime rates in Europe, at 67 reported crimes per 1,000 (by comparison, the U.K.'s rate is 95.6 per 1,000; Sweden 136.8 per 1,000; Germany 76.3 per 1,000; Belgium 82.9 per 1,000 and Denmark at 94.6 per 1,000).

So, the crime rate in Spain is low, then why the sense of unease? That can be explained by the growth rate of reported crime over a five-year period. The deliquency rate in Spain for the 1995-2000 period was 9.5%, well above the European average of a paltry 0.7% for the same period.

To put this all in focus, and with a bit of spin: Spain's deliquency rate is still the lowest in Europe, despite having one of the highest growth rates for the five-year period in question. And while that sharp rise is causing the "social" unease, it shouldn't be forgotten that the rate is still well below the EU average.

With respect to homicides, which are dropping throughout Europe, there is some alarming data.

In 2000, there were 1,323 murders, for a rate of 3.3 murders per 100,000, compared to the EU average of 1.7 murders per 100,000 (France 1.8; Germany 1.2; Italy 1.4; Sweden 2; Finland 2.9) , and the US rate of 5 murders per 100,000. For the 1995-2000 period Spain's homicide rate rose around 34%, while the EU average dropped close to 8%.

Why the sharp turnaround, especially with respect to violent crime? The answer is a four-and-a-half-letter word: d*r*u*g (s).

Because of its geographical position, connecting Europe with Africa and ties to the Americas, Spain is a country with a time-honored tradition of smuggling. But where under Franco and others that tradition was tolerated, in modern times its come back to haunt them. Perhaps, the biggest change came in the late 1970s, when the Galician smugglers from the northern province of Spain began to use their tobacco rings to bring in cocaine, as well as - but to a lesser extant - heroin and hashish.

Up until that time, the mafias often smuggled in tobacco that had been bought directly from the source: large American and European tobacco companies. While sometimes the reason a tobacco company may want to supply smugglers with tobacco rests no further than tax evasion, in the case of some American providers, the issue had more to do with US legislation --- tobacco has to be removed from the shelves after six months.

This meant that, rather than toss the weed, companies would sell the good to smugglers (cutting their losses), who would in turn make a healthy profit selling the goods in other countries. In Spain, it was quite easy to spot smuggled tobacco, identified with a "red" stamp, while taxed-in-Spain tobacco had a "blue" stamp.

The goods were usually brought in, often taking advantage of Spain having one of the largest fishing fleets in the world, by boat, where it was unloaded onto speed boats that then raced inland, where the tobacco would then begin its overland journey before its final resting place, usually in small pubs and cafeterias dotting the land. To this day, in the south of Spain at Gibraltar it's possible at night to hear the roar of high speed boats rushing goods across the border and into Spain.

By the 1980s though, the Spanish mafias had begun to hook up with South American drug lords - including Pablo Escobar - and the promise of even bigger financial gains. And in fact, while the US was closing down on many of the Latin American providers, many of them were slipping away to Galicia. With the introduction of the South American mafias and a new product, the "gentleman" smuggler also going the way of the dinosaurs.

Not always is the case related to drugs, but they often go hand-in-hand. A few years ago in Madrid a South American gang was broken up. They had moved to Spain with the express idea of holding up chalets, getting enough cash saved up, and then planned to head back to their homelands.

In the last few years, there have been other forms of traficking. Supposedly, there are Romanian prostitution rings, on the Southern coast there is the Russian mafia, and in the bigger cities, there are South American and Chinese rings.

Now, just let me clarify all this...and this is where I began this very long post. Has the rate of violent crime risen in Spain? Yes. Is it directly related to immigration? No. In fact, most studies show that first generation immigrants have a lower crime rate than the public at large - with the exception of Sweden.

The question isn't immigration, but rather one of drug control. But that is for another post.

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