[Anchor]

Following the case of the mishandled missing person report in Jeju, people are increasingly saying they are afraid to visit. Statistics showing that Jeju has the highest crime rate in the country are also fueling anxiety, and we took a closer look at these numbers.

Morning Zoom-In, reporter Lee Gyeong-won.

[Reporter]

[YouTube video: It seems to have gone way past serious, I guess I'm too scared to go to Jeju Island anymore.]

Talk about how Jeju Island is scary because of crime spread, and a video from six months ago by a singer who claimed to have faced threats of murder while traveling in Jeju in the past has also garnered renewed attention.

[Sung Hyun-woo / Singer (Video from last February): A middle-aged man just came running. Really, he came running with a knife.]

We conducted a comprehensive analysis of crime data based on the police's recent statistics from 2024.

The total comes to approximately 1.58 million cases.

In Jeju, there were about 4,000 crimes per 100,000 residents, showing a large gap with Busan, which ranked second.

It is true that it ranks overwhelmingly first.

We looked into the data in more detail based on some 220 cities, counties, and districts.

Even within major metropolitan areas like Seoul, Busan, Daegu, and Incheon, downtown areas specifically rank at the very top.

Jeju ranks 11th. While still high, downtown areas and tourist destinations share a common characteristic.

There are many people coming and going, but relatively few residents.

Regional crime rates are calculated by dividing the number of crimes by the resident population. But with many people coming and going?

Since that means a lot of people gather there, crimes would occur accordingly.

On the other hand, if the resident population is relatively small, the denominator shrinks.

Naturally, the crime rate goes up.

Jeju Island has a resident population of 670,000 and 13 million visitors a year.

If you look at the types of crimes in Jeju as well.

Violent crimes such as murder, robbery, and rape ranked 27th nationwide, which was not as high as people worried.

Rather, fraud crimes were unusually frequent, ranking 6th.

Violent petty crimes such as property damage, intimidation, and assault were also driving up Jeju's crime rate.

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At the same time, the issue of crimes committed by Chinese nationals in Jeju is also being discussed.

Among foreign suspects in Jeju the year before last, Chinese nationals accounted for an overwhelming 68%. However, when calculated based on all domestic and foreign suspects combined in Jeju, Chinese nationals accounted to 1.5%.

The national average is 1.3%.

(Producer: Kim Do-kyun, Han Seung-ho | XR: Jeon Yu-geun, Kim Min-young | Cameraperson: Seol Min-hwan | Video Editor: Kim Jong-tae)