That's just the most recent example: from petty crime to rape and terrifying extremist attacks, virtually all crime is committed by men. In 2024, only 1 in 18 adult prisoners in the EU were women.

This figure is very similar be it in Finland or Romania, in countries with high or low migration, or in countries with high or low crime rates.

We looked in detail at crime rates in Sweden and the three largest European countries, and they speak for themselves:

Most perpetrators are young men. According to UN data from 2023, roughly 44% of homicide suspects worldwide were aged 15-29. Conversely, men of that age are also the group at highest risk of being killed globally.

While homicides have decreased by 11% in the last decade, rape and sexual violence increased by 7% and 10% respectively in the same period, likely linked to increased awareness. According to the European Commission, 99% of those convicted for those crimes are, again, men.

“But what about immigrants?!”

Now, one might respond: don't immigrants commit significantly more violence? Well, it depends how you look at it:

A 2026 study by a Madrid university analysed over 5.5 million offences that ended in a final conviction in Spain between 2007 and 2023. Its conclusion: immigration itself does not explain crime levels once demographics and socioeconomic factors are accounted for.

That's because immigrants in Spain are younger and are more likely to be male than Spaniards, which contributes to their higher overall crime rate. Once this is factored in, the difference in crime rate between foreigners and Spaniards falls by 48%.

A gap does remain – foreign nationals are convicted at roughly twice the Spanish rate – but when you look at where these foreigners come from, it's quite different to what the stereotypical political debate would have you believe.

Men from Brazil, Paraguay, Senegal, and Ukraine are convicted at lower rates than men from France, Belgium, or Romania, who all hold EU residency. Men from Mexico, Mali, or Pakistan are convicted of crimes at even lower rates than Spanish men.

The study also concluded that the foreigners that commit some of the crimes usually associated with immigration, such as drug crime, are not immigrants, but short-stay tourists or part of organised transnational crime.

Furthermore, victims of crime committed by immigrants are usually immigrants themselves, especially immigrant women in the context of sexual violence.

What predicts crime rates consistently, according to the study, is urbanisation and average age. Across every group the study examined, men are convicted at roughly six times the rate women are, regardless of origin.