A five-year crime prevention strategy for the Maltese Islands beginning in 2017 was announced by Minister for Home Affairs and National Security Carmelo Abela at a meeting dedicated to public consultation on the initiative.

The document, which was presented by Dr Janice Formosa Pace, covers a range of proposals which deal with education, youth justice, policing for crime prevention, crime families, sex offending, pick-pocketing, recidivism and victim support.

The strategy, which according to Mr Abela is "ambitious" and the first of its kind in Malta, serves to create "better protection for the community".

The Minister called the project "a new chapter in the prevention of crime" which uses a detailed analysis of real and dark figures of crime to create a program which serves as not just as  reactive and preventive actions but as a more holistic and proactive solution.

According to the minister, the information revolution and internet age has led many nations to re-evaluate and evolve they way it deals with crime due to ever changing faces of both criminals and victims. He stressed the importance of international cooperation when dealing with crime that does not have any borders and is able to move beyond any frontier leaving countless people susceptible to crimes such as fraud, paedophilia and mental abuse.

The need for cooperation amongst different entities from a local perspective was also proposed, with Mr Abela calling on various organizations such as families, local councils, police forces, probation and parole officers, and prison authorities to come together to create a safer society.

Dr Formosa Pace, the author of the document, then went into further detail on the proposals. Beginning with education, she advocated school-based prevention through specialized programmes which tackle domestic violence and potential high risk youths in hotspot areas such as Birzebbuga, St Paul's Bay and Floriana.

The proposals will also include the introduction of a "violence-prevention curriculum" through PSCD lessons.

When talking about the proposals regarding Youth Justice, the criminologist explained that in Malta 50% of juvenile offenders are 15 years, whereas 14 year olds make up a quarter of said offenders. She also mentioned that the average age group of Maltese inmates ranges from 20-24 years old. The strategy she explained would seed to address the needs of specific target groups of youth aged 14-16 and 17-21.
The document says that to implement this it would begin through frontline services, which means the introduction of intervention teams when a youth is arrested and continues to provide assistance to the offender and the offender's family members to ensure youths are supported and informed throughout the process which may lead to persecution.

These intervention teams will also be extended to referred youths and will provide troubled youths with psycho-social support systems.

The policing for crime prevention was next on the agenda, with Dr Formosa Pace placing particular emphasis on the need for greater investment in training of both new recruits and current members of the police force which will focus on their operations within the community itself and dealing with domestic violence and sexual abuse victims.

She then spoke about the introduction of community policing whereby the community itself assists the police force namely through regular meetings with the local council.

Again, the focus on hotspots and hot times would be essential in the further prevention of crime specifically within the growing phenomenon of pick pocketing and theft on the island which has rapidly increased over the last couple of years according to Dr Formosa Pace.

Pick pocketing will be given a dedicated campaign educating persons not to be susceptible to the offence.

The crime prevention strategy also confronts the issue of crime families. This, the document explains, is used to confront the issue of numerous offenders within the same family, with about a third of the population registered at the Corradino Correctional Facility between 1950 and 2010 belonged to a family with other offenders. Dr Formosa Pace's studies show that having a sibling, parent and/or spouse involved in crime increases the chance of the person becoming an offender. The document also highlights the psycho-social and economic issues surrounding relatives of incarcerated inmates.

To confront this, the document proposes the introduction of nationwide hotlines and/or online platforms to assist these vulnerable persons, and the introduction of greater family and educational support within communities which are concentrations of crime families.

Dr Formosa Pace also puts forward the idea that neighbourhoods which host a concentration of crime families will require a think tank made of geographers, criminologists, urban planners and the police to tackle the issue. She claims that there is substantial evidence to suggest that criminality is location and time specific. This she admits may sound like displacement of individuals however she stressed that it would mainly involve target investigations of the areas.

The problem regarding recidivism needs to be confronted, Dr Formosa Pace insisted, specifically through the targeted training and employment of offenders in order to successfully rehabilitate and become contributing members of society. She also stressed the needs of the inmates highlighting the need of a pool of professionals ranging from medical staff, psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, career advisers and many more in to provide their services to inmates both at Corradino and juvenile detention facilities.
There is also reform needed in victim support according to the document which looks for a review of referral of victims and studying the cases of repeated victimization.