Changes in crime typologies and efficiency of criminal justice in recent years: some unexpected relationship

The causes of crime are various, and variously related to each other: by example, economic conditions certainly play an important role in the growth of crimes against property, while political and legislative choices can stimulate, in one way or another, the evolution of crimes against the Public Administration. However, even if the statistical study of the specific causes of crime seems impractical, it is possible to correlate its dynamics with other phenomena looking for possible matches. Therefore, in this paper we seek a possible relationship (presumably non-linear and surely influenced by contextual, unobservable factors) between the spatial-temporal evolution of the most common crimes and the legal system's ability to cope with the workload arising, i.e. the efficiency of the criminal justice system, using available data on a regional basis.