Psychological abuse made up 50% of domestic violence cases reported to police in 2019, NSO says
The National Statistics Office says police received 1,532 reports of domestic abuse in 2019
The police received 1,532 reports of alleged domestic violence in 2019, 50% of which related to psychological abuse, the National Statistics Office revealed (NSO) said on Thursday.
The Domestic Violence Unit (DVU) within Aġenzija Appogg received 1,870 cases during the same year. Of these 1,293 involved physical abuse, 626 were related to sexual or economic abuse, while the nature of two cases was not revealed.
In 2019 2,565 persons used services offered to those experiencing domestic violence, an increase of 41.2% from 1,816 in 2016. 80% of the people who used such services in 2019 were women.
In the same year, more than half of the total cases registered across all services involved persons aged under 40. The majority of service users were also Maltese nationals.
Emergency Health Services shelters received 74 cases, all pertaining to physical abuse.
Out of the 1,532 cases the police department received, 724 related to physical abuse, 777 involved physiological abuse and 31 cases were related to sexual or economic abuse.
When considering the size of the resident population within each district, the Southern Harbour and South-Eastern districts had the highest number of cases registered for every 1,000 residents within the districts, with 4.8% and 4.6%, respectively.
Across all districts, the number of cases registered with the Police Department per 1,000 resident females was at least double that for resident males.
The Stop! programme registered 99 cases dealing with perpetrators of domestic violence, while the Department of Probation and Parole registered 66 cases in 2019.
The majority of perpetrators across all cases were aged between 30 and 49, with the largest share of cases involving perpetrators of Maltese nationality.
When looking at the unique number of persons using the perpetrator services, 2019 saw a total of 144 individuals using one or more service - 136 males and eight females.