Criminality descends about 3%, but follows the rebound of sexual aggressions | Spain
Less crimes, but more sexual aggressions. The crime balance of the first quarter of 2025, made public this Wednesday by the Ministry of Interior, includes a decrease of 2.8% the number of criminal offenses with respect to the same period of the year, going from 606,377 to 589,683 the crimes known to the security forces. Despite this descent in the absolute figures, the statistics – which include the figures of the National Police, Civil Guard, Ertzaintza, Mossos d’EsquadraForal Police of Navarra and local police – collects an increase, among other crimes, from those of a sexual nature, which go from 4,585 to 4,760, 3.8% more than in 2024. The increase is more pronounced in aggressions with penetration, which go from 1,154 to 1,242, 7.6%.
In the balance, interior, which emphasizes that this increase is percentage lower than that registered last year with respect to the same 2023 period and insists that “the increase sustained in this type of crime” has partly to do with “the active policies of awareness and reduction of social and personal tolerance against this type of criminal acts, which translate into a greater disposition of victims to denounce them”. The department of Fernando Grande-Marlaska considers that this « reduces the existing infra levels in relation to these criminal types » and, therefore, elevates the number of complaints.
The criminality balance also emphasizes the complaints of cyberdelites, which links “to the penetration and use of the Internet in Spain” that has resulted in “growing forms of trade and purchases online” for years and, especially, since 2016. This type of crime already represents two out of 10 criminal offenses known after passing in just nine years of 70,178 registered events in 2016 412,850 crimes throughout 2024, which represents an increase close to 500%. In the first quarter of this year, these staple were 106,801 cases, a figure that represents 87.8% of all crime on the Internet and 18.1% of the entire crime. However, it is a 3.5% decrease compared to the same period of 2024.
Regarding crimes against heritage (robberies, thefts and subtraction of vehicles), which represent 42.6% of conventional crime and is one of the criminal offenses that generates the most feeling of insecurity in citizenship, the balance reflects a decrease in a set of 5.3%. This decrease was greater in robberies with violence or intimidation (from 14,945 to 13,540, 9.4% less), and in robberies with force at home, establishments and other facilities (which have decreased by 14.3% over 2024 as of 30,660 to 26,279). The thefts have gone from 156,932 cases in the first three months of last year to 151,750, 3.3% less.
Those who have increased are crimes related to drug trafficking, from 5,040 made to 5,287, 4.9% more. In this sense, Interior relates this increase not to an increase in this type of crime, but with an improvement in the effectiveness of police efficacy in the fight against drug trafficking that links specific plans such as the Special Security Plan deployed in recent years in the area of the Campo de Gibraltar. « Since very few complaints are produced in this criminal phenomenon, » the Department of Grande-Marlaska emphasizes that this increase is, in fact, « an indicator of police activity against this type of crime. »
