Profile of Residential Robbery in South Africa

May 16th, 2009

These are extracts from research done on residential robberies and interviews with arrested/convicted robbers by Dr. Rudolph Zinn from UNISA’s School of Criminal Justice.

• 8 out of 10 residential robberies are committed with the help of information from domestic workers, gardeners and former employees.
• A lot of the MO revolves around gathering intelligence about the target home and residents, i.e. inside information from domestic workers.
• House robberies have increased by 13.5% in the past year.
• Of the almost 15 000 residential robberies committed in 2008, 50% took place in Gauteng.
• Average age of a house robber is 19 - 26 years.
• Average of 30% of all house robbers have committed murder or are willing to commit murder.
• 17% of house robbers are foreigners.
• 90% of arrested robbers had no matric or were unemployed.
• The 10% who were employed gave up their jobs when confirming how much they could make from a robbery.
• Most victims/targets are affluent persons who openly display their wealth, i.e. expensive cars, jewellery, upmarket homes.
• Most attacks occur between 19h00 and 00h00 as people are relaxed, busy cooking or watching television and the security systems and beams are not activated.
• An average of R5 000 is stolen during each robbery.
• Victims of house robberies are only seriously injured in 2% of all incidents.
• 35% of robbers rob for basic needs (hunger, poverty). 65% enjoyed the money and spent it on clothes, cars, houses.
• The average robber commits 103 robberies over 7 years before being caught.
• 97% of robbers are armed.
• Most attacks takes place 10 - 30 minutes drive from the attackers home or base.
• Women are more often tortured or hurt during house robberies.
• On average there are 4 members in an armed robbery gang.
• Conviction rate for house robberies in South Africa is 7.67%; in the USA it is 53%.
• The biggest deterrent confirmed by robbers themselves are small dogs that are kept inside the home.
• Alarm systems and armed reaction services are not a deterrent.
• Electric fences, CCTV and detection beams do however deter robbers.
• They will monitor the home and movements for as long as is needed to formulate a plan of attack, sometimes up to 2 weeks.
• All gangs research and monitor the response times of armed response companies.