In message , Mike Williamson
writes
Paul J. Adam wrote:
But again, UK burglars tend to avoid occupied homes as well.
Acording to a January '03 article on the BBC news site, 53% of
burglaries in England take place WHILE THE OWNERS/OCCUPANTS WERE
PRESENT.

A quick check indicates that this relates to night-time successful
burglaries

To quote the British Crime Survey for 1999,

"In a quarter (25%) of burglaries someone was at home and aware of what
was happening."
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs/hosb499.pdf

Note that the UK definition counts "burglary" as attempts to make entry
which are foiled, which may well skew the figures for "occupied
burglary" upwards (nearly half the 'burglaries' in the UK are
unsuccessful attempts)


According to the BCS:

"Domestic burglary peaked in 1993 and fell by around 45% between 1993
and 2001.

In 2002/03, just over 3 in 100 households were burgled (this includes
attempted burglaries and burglaries where nothing was taken). "
http://www.crimestatistics.org.uk/output/Page55.asp

This corresponds interestingly with the 2002 US DoJ figures citing 27.7
burglaries per 1,000 households: just under 3 per 100.
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/cvus02.pdf


On a quick scan it seems interesting that while more incidents are
apparently reported in the UK, just under half of those reports are
unsuccessful attempts, while in the US 23.5 per 1000 households
experience *successful* burglaries.

A google search on burglary rates, US and UK brought up several
articles on comparative crime rates- the US has lower rates of
car theft, burglaries, assaults (muggings, etc.) than the UK- in
fact, with the (significant) exceptions of murder and rape, England
has much higher rates of all forms of violent crime than the United
States.

Are you comparing like with like? The US is in general a much less
densely populated place, and violent crime tends to be concentrated in
more urban areas: before you even get into what "burglary" means to
different compilers of statistics.





--
When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite.
W S Churchill

Paul J. Adam MainBoxatjrwlynch[dot]demon{dot}co(.)uk