Defining and Registering Criminal Offences and Measures - Oapen

Prosecution 195
Extract of the final questionnaire
The counting unit required here is the case (in the sense of proceedings relating
to one person only). One case may combine several offences; one offence
may lead to several cases. Where the use of the case as the counting unit is not
possible, proceedings (i.e. not necessarily related to only one person) should
be used. If both do not apply, the person is the counting unit. Persons are
counted if each suspect is counted only once each year, although there might
be many proceedings against him or her in the given year.
What is the counting unit used?
Case (= proceedings relating
to one person only)
Proceedings Person Other
(please explain)
It is important to distinguish between ‘input’ and ‘output’ statistics. The ‘output’
(i.e. disposals made by the prosecuting authority) are the preferred statistics.
In addition, the figures for pending cases, i.e. those cases that enter the
prosecution stage in the reference year but are not disposed of in the same
year should be provided if possible.
Definitions
Input cases:
All cases of criminal offences, which are passed to the prosecuting authority for
disposal in the reference year
Output cases:
All disposals made by the prosecuting authority in the reference year
Pending cases:
All cases pending at the end of reference year
Connection between input, output and pending cases:
For each year: Output = pending of previous year + input - pending of current
year