Most Dutch criminals commit crime in hometown

Over half of the people suspected of a crime in the Netherlands committed that crime in the same municipality in which they live, according to an analysis of crime figures from 2016 by Statistics Netherlands. The police registered 268 thousand suspects last year.

Almost a third of suspects came from a different municipality. About 14 percent of suspects don't have a fixed address in the Netherlands. In nearly a fifth of crimes, the suspects live in one of the four large Dutch cities - Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague and Utrecht.

When looked only at the large cities, Amsterdam is the city in which crimes are most often committed by people living somewhere else. Nearly a quarter of suspects in Amsterdam crimes don't even live in the Netherlands. The many cases of pickpocketing during big events in the Dutch capital play a big role in this.

Hague criminals don't like to travel far from home. Two thirds of the crimes committed in The Hague were committed by people who live there.

In the larger municipalities along the Dutch border, a large part of the suspected criminals come from abroad. In Roermond, Maastricht, Venlo and Roosendaal over a fifth of the criminals don't have an address in the Netherlands.