Gerichtliche Kriminalstatistik 2008

This publication contains a statistical account of legal convictions in 2008 broken down by various legal and demographic characteristics, and also includes an overview of trends since 1947. For the second time in this series statistics on recidivism are published covering the observation period 2004 to 2008.

The basis for judicial criminal statistics is provided by an extract from the register of criminal records, forwarded by the criminal records office and evaluated by Statistics Austria (§ 13 of the Criminal Records Act 1968, Federal Law Gazette No. 277, in the version in force). These extract records legal convictions handed down by Austrian criminal courts in the 2008 reporting year that were based on the criminal code or supplementary penal laws due to actions that are punishable by law. In the case of conviction on the grounds of several actions that are punishable by law, the conviction is assigned to the "leading offence", i.e. the article that is decisive for the punishment imposed. Statistics on recidivism are based on persons being legally convicted (except for unconditional prison sentences) or released from prison in the year 2004.

The explanations in the text section should be referred to when comparing this publication with statistics of previous years. These explanations document legal changes that influence the way in which the statistics are compiled or that result in breaks in the time series. In this connection, reference is made to the significantly reduced number of convictions between 1999 and 2000 due to diversion now also being applicable to adults in criminal law. Monetary penalties have been expressed in euros since the 2002 reporting year. Explanations about the statistics on recidivism are given by the Institute for the Sociology of Law and Criminology in Vienna.

This publication is available in German only.