DRUG AND gun crime is showing the first signs of peaking as the drugs trade appears to have been hit by the recession, new crime figures reveal.
New data from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) shows detections for drug-dealing declined in 18 of the 28 Garda divisions across the State in the first nine months of 2009.
The fall follows sustained increasing trends across the State, over the past five years which saw drug-dealing detections more than double.
The figures show that in all six Garda divisions within the Dublin metropolitan region, where drug-dealing has always been worst, the number of people detected with drugs for sale or supply more than doubled between 2004 and 2008.
However, in the first nine months of 2009 the climb was halted and a fall-off began.
The reduction in Dublin has been in single-digit percentages but is seen as significant because it comes after such a sustained climb over the past five years.
Larger reductions in drug-dealing cases in the first nine months of 2009 have been recorded in the following divisions:
Cavan-Monaghan (down 48 per cent); Sligo-Leitrim (down 50 per cent); Galway (down 32 per cent); Cork North (down 16 per cent); Cork West (down 8 per cent); Limerick (down 19 per cent); Laois/ Offaly (down 50 per cent); Westmeath (down 16 per cent); Kildare (down 35 per cent).
In 10 divisions increases have been recorded. However, these have been only marginal or from a very low base.
The CSO figures represent the first time that crime data has been broken down on a Garda division by division basis.
The number of detections of “drugs for personal use” cases, which involve very small quantities of drugs, doubled or trebled in most Garda divisions between 2004 and 2008.
The six Dublin divisions showed a combined near fourfold increase; from 1,468 cases in the first nine months of 2004 to 5,377 cases in the first nine months of 2008.
However, in the first nine months of 2009 the number of cases declined in 16 of the 28 Garda divisions. Most of the reductions were below 10 per cent.
All comparative figures are for the first nine months of the years in question because data for the final quarter of 2009 is not yet available.
Garda sources say the drug case falls may have occurred because the recession has meant recreational users no longer have as much money to spend on drugs.
The new CSO crime data confirms the widely held belief that west Dublin and Limerick have the worst gun crime. However, both locations witnessed the largest decline in gun crime last year of all 28 Garda divisions.
For example, in the Dublin western division there were 98 cases of possession of a firearm or discharge of a firearm in the first nine months of 2008. In the same period in 2009 that figure fell to 77 cases, down over 20 per cent.
In Limerick there were 68 cases of possession or discharge of a firearm in the first nine months of 2008. That figure fell to 45 cases in the first nine months of 2009, down one-third.
While many believe north Dublin has a much more significant gun culture than south Dublin, the real split is between the east and west of the city.
For example, in the Dublin northern, north central and southern divisions the incidence of possession or discharge of a firearm has been broadly similar, with 44, 32 and 38 cases respectively in the first nine months of 2009.
However, an east-west comparison reveals a very different gun crime problem in those two parts of the city.
In the Dublin western division there were 77 cases of possession or discharge of a firearm in the first nine months of 2009 compared with just six cases in the Dublin eastern division.
The murder rate nationally increased to 42 cases – 24 in Dublin – in the first nine months of 2009, compared with 33 cases in 2008. However, it is still down from its peak of 59 cases in the first nine months of 2007.
There were no murders in 10 Garda divisions in the first nine months of 2009. The Dublin western division, with 11 cases, was the only division where murders exceeded five in the period.