The respected “La Vanguardia” newspaper reported on Wednesday October 19th that Barcelona was experiencing 31 reported robberies per hour, every hour.
The article is entitled “Barcelona sufrió 31 robos cada hora durante el primer semestre de 2011″ or “Barcelona suffers 31 robberies every hour during the first semester of 2011.”
Felip Puig reveals the figures. Foto: ACN / Oriol Campuzano
That’s one every two minutes, 31 an hour, totaling 744 per day, or 23,064 per month, which equals 136,663 in the first six months of 2011, which if the level remains the same for this next six month period… is 273,326 for the year 2011.
That’s over a quarter of a million reported robberies. I keep using the word “reported” because I’ve had a father, mother and aunt all robbed, and they didn’t report their incidents. How many thousands more don’t report? And it pains me to ask… is there any point in reporting when such extraordinary numbers fail to result in change?
The 136,663 figure breaks down as follows: 56,133 robbery offenses (40,017 involving property and 16,116 for theft), and 80,530 misdemeanors (43,826 property and 36,704 for theft). Spanish law makes a distinction between “hurtos” and “delitos” and “faltas”, and some crimes are considered to be of one type and others another.
It’s so confusing we’re going to paste in the Spanish text here for those who speak the language: “en Barcelona 56.133 delitos por robo (40.017 contra el patrimonio y 16.116 por hurto) y 80.530 faltas (43.826 contra el patrimonio y 36.704 por hurto).” In fact, maybe someone can enlighten us?
The numbers are so jaw dropping that they easily beat the 115,055 tally for 2009, as reported in the same newspaper – La Vanguardia.
The figure was unveiled by the Minister of the Interior, Felip Puig.
Mr Puig has a battle on his hands.
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Felip Puig is too busy with the 15-M movement. That people is very dangerous and the police hit them everytime that they can… People asking for a real democracy without using violence…
But when talking about robberies, he looks another way…
[...] It’s possible we’re alarmist, but it’s kind of hard not to be when we deal with the topic daily… we get alarmed! Then again, if there are 31 reported robberies every hour, there are 31 reported robberies every hour. [...]