Males are more likely to commit crimes, yes; but not necessarily as much as conviction statistics would suggest. There is systematic under-reporting and under-prosecution of crimes committed by females, which seems to be driven largely by a perception that women are "harmless".

They are probably committing different kinds of infractions, too. Some of them more criminalised than others.

That wouldn't be relevant; Japan is skewing old, but doesn't have a similar gender imbalance.

Edit: to clarify, I am saying that Japan does not have a gender ratio all that different from other countries - meaning that gender differences shed no light on its crime rates. It's an irrelevant statistic.

That's amazing! "A 2013 global study on homicide by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime found that males accounted for about 96 percent of all homicide perpetrators worldwide."[1]. I wonder what's so unique about Japanese culture that keeps homicide rates by gender in balance?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_crime#World...