Original article (in Slovenian) was published on 19/07/2022
The Nova24TV portal reported on 2 July that almost all registered offenders in Sweden had a criminal background according to police data.
The article did not explain what the term registered offender is supposed to mean. The Slovenian Police and the State Prosecution told Razkrinkavanje.si that they do not use this term.
Police in Sweden told Razkrinkavanje.si that they do not have data on the share of person with an immigrant background among offenders. They referred us to the Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention (Brå), which studies crime trends and tracks case law. They shared with us a report for 2021 in which they analysed data on the ethnic background of crime suspects, not convicts.
For the period between 2007 and 2018 Brå determined that the share of suspects of Swedish and mixed origin was 51.8% in 2018. The share of suspects with an immigrant background, which includes non-residents, stood at 48.2%.
Brå divides the suspects according to a model developed by the Swedish statistical office SCB, which defines a person as having an immigrant background if they were born abroad or born in Sweden to foreign parents. All those born in Sweden who have at least one Swedish parent are designated as Swedish.
Brå determined that the share of suspects of Swedish or mixed origin declined in the last 15 years, whereas the number of suspects with an immigrant background rose by 6.2 percentage points. The report attributes this to stronger immigration since the share of immigrants in the overall population has been increasing.
The claim that the majority of registered offenders in Sweden have an immigrant background is not true.