This report deals with criminal cases finalised by the New South Wales (NSW) Local, Children's, District, Supreme and Licensing Courts in 2006.

The data presented in the report is collected from the courts and maintained by the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research, with one exception. Data for the tables on prior proven offences for persons found guilty is sourced from the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research's Reoffending Database.

The majority of Children's Court data presented in this publication is collected directly by the Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research. Prior to January 2006, this data was collected by the Department of Juvenile Justice. The Department of Juvenile Justice continues to provide raw data for the noncomputerised courts, which is further processed by the Bureau. Due to this change in the data source, Children's Court data for this year should not be directly compared with that published in previous reports.

Minor criminal matters such as regulatory driving offences issued through infringement notices and appeals to infringement notices are not included in the report.

In 2006 there was a 2.1 per cent decrease in the number of persons/organisations with matters finalised in the Local Courts (down to 135,574). The number of persons/organisations with matters finalised in the Licensing Court decreased (down by 13.1 per cent to 325). The number of persons finalised in trial and sentence cases in the Higher Courts has fallen slightly (down 2.4 per cent to 3,468).

From 2006, through the use of the Police H-numbers, procedures for the Local Court collection have been implemented to merge withdrawn charges with any associated charges finalised on a later date. Data in this publication should not be directly compared with data published in previous years. The Bureau can, however, provide comparable data back to 2003.

Published by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research