Homicide in Scotland 1998: CrJ/1999/7

7. Time for cases to be dealt with by the criminal justice system (Table 15)

7.1 In the majority of homicide cases an accused person is charged within 1 month of the date the homicide is recorded. For those persons who have been charged with a homicide that was recorded in 1998, 91 per cent were charged within a month of the date when the homicide was recorded. For most accused persons the period from date of charging to the completion of criminal proceedings is 3 to 6 months. In 1998, proceedings were completed within 6 months for 81 per cent of those for whom a final outcome was reached. At 12^th November 1999, 68 per cent of all persons accused of homicide cases in 1998 were known to have had proceedings completed within one year of the crime being recorded.

8. International comparisons of homicide rates (Table 16)

8.1 While care must be taken in making international comparisons of crime statistics, due to different counting rules and definitions, it is of interest to observe how Scotland’s homicide rate compares with those of other countries. The rates compared here are from 1997, as these are the latest published data available for most countries. Scotland’s homicide rate in 1997 was 17.6 victims per million population (less than the rate in 1998 of 19.5). This was higher than the rate in England and Wales (14.2), lower than in Northern Ireland (25.1) and comparable with the rates of Sweden (17.7) and Denmark (16.7).

8.2 Glasgow had a homicide rate of 44.1 victims per million in 1997, similar to the rates in Belfast (44.0) and Berlin (43.4), and almost double the rate in London (24). Most other European cities had lower homicide rates than Glasgow, except Copenhagen, which appeared to have a particularly high number of homicides in 1997. In comparison with most American cities, however, the homicide rates in Scotland were relatively low. Edinburgh’s homicide rate in 1997 was towards the low end of homicide rates in capital cities.