Italy: Crime Down… Except in Leftist-Controlled Cities

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JEAN CHRISTOPHE MAGNENET/AFP/Getty Images
Kurt Zindulka

While crime rates fell overall in Italy under the leadership of former Minister of the Interior Matteo Salvini, cities controlled by mayors of the Italian left-wing Partito Democratico (PD) saw the largest amounts of criminal complaints in the country.

Crime fell drastically in Italy during Matteo Salvini’s tenure as Interior Minister, and it is claimed this was in large part thanks to his crackdown on migrant arrivals to Italy, reducing the number of migrants by about 95 per cent. It is unclear whether his policies will continue following his departure from the Ministry of the Interior, and the creation of a new Five Star-Democratic Party (PD) coalition after the old government collapsed.

Milan topped the list of criminal complaints in Italy, with 7,017 per 100,000 inhabitants, followed up by Rimini (6,430), Florence (6,252), and Bologna (6,233). Florence saw the most substantial increase in criminal activity, with a 9.5 per cent jump in crime in the past year, Il Giornale reports.

It is possible that one reason for higher crime rates in cities controlled by left-wing mayors may be the high levels of welfare available to residents, which may act as a magnet to the economically inactive, which often includes newly arrived migrants.

As Breitbart London has reported, migrants in Italy are statistically more likely to commit crimes than native-born Italians. Indeed, while the foreign-born population of Italy accounts for 8.7 per cent of the population it is responsible for one in five crimes committed in the country, with some studies putting the figure as high as one in three.

On the trend of migrants moving to left-wing cities, a city administration insider told Italian newspaper Il Giornale that ample goodwill creates “opportunities for those who want to take advantage of it.”

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