A crime victim in Rossland? You're more likely to get hassled by a bear
By Andrew Zwicker
Out of the underwhelming news story of the week file, RCMP recently presented Rossland City Council with crime statistics in our safe little mountain town for the first half of the year. Not surprisingly ,the numbers are low across the board and in all recorded categories but one, the incidences of reported crimes are down over the same period from last year.
Of course with such low numbers, drawing any meaningful trends from the data becomes difficult. As was noted around the council table during discussion, one or two “troublesome” people in town can dramatically sway the numbers.
There was just a single reported drug offense in the first half of 2010 in Rossland, down from two during that same period in 2009.
The one category that saw an increase was impaired driving charges, which rose from one in the first half of 2009 to two in the first half of 2010.
There was not a single murder, sexual assault, attempted break and enter or fatal accident from January to July of 2010. Oddly enough, while there were no attempted break and enters, there were two break and entering charges laid, down from three last year. There were also four non-sexual assaults, matching last year’s total for the time period.
Motor vehicle theft saw a sharp drop with just two cases reported as opposed to six for the same period last year.
The most common offenses continue to be theft, mischief, and possession of stolen property. January to June saw 24 cases reported. This was down from 29 the year before, however.
While drawing trends from such small data samples can be difficult, one conclusion can be drawn as clear as day: Rosslanders are lucky to live in a town where you’re more likely to have trouble with the wildlife than the other human beings in town.
