Graham reports back from Friends of Scholes Park meeting
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by Lib Dem team on 13 November, 2018
From our local Police:
Simon Knight, 42, was detained by officers with the help of the community and social media acting promptly on 22/08/18, for a residential burglary in Bramhall. In October Knight was sentenced to 5 years imprisonment for the above crime.
We currently have a male detained and remanded for 2 x residential burglaries, 2 x theft of motor vehicles and handling stolen goods. One of those burglaries took place in Bramhall, he will be due in court soon while the investigation is ongoing.
Also, the annual Christmas light switch on will be held in Stockport Town Centre on 14th November from 1500hrs.
In Cheadle we have had 46 residential burglaries recorded between 01/10/18 – 08/11/18, the burglaries appear equally spread across the area.
The majority of these incidents record point of entry being the through the rear garden and through rear door/s. In addition, several incidents recorded gardens/doors and windows being insecure.
One burglary of note, states the offenders cut the alarm wire and smashed off the alarm box, which is a method not often heard of.
There have been 24 theft from motor vehicles, unfortunately there isn’t a lot of information regarding the circumstances of these incidents, as the vehicle have been broken into whilst unattended.
Also, there have been 30 incidents of criminal damage, many of these incidents occurred on Halloween and Bonfire nights, involving youths with fireworks and one incident involving a young person in a clown mask.
8 Comments
Of the 46 burglaries, 24 thefts from motor vehicles and 30 incidents of criminal damage.
It would be interesting to know how many of these 100 crimes did the police have the time and resources to investigate and how many were just given a crime number.
I agree with John, I’d like some figures too. Chances are, it’s a small handful of ‘people’ that are responsible for them all so catching just one can see the crime rates fall dramatically. The effects on the victims can be life changing so more needs to be done. You’re lucky if you get a phone call 2 weeks after a burglary nowadays, they just don’t have the resources to investigate. The idea of 2 officers covering a massive area is a frightening thought, & criminals are very aware of this & are taking advantage.
I’m sure Jane’s right that there are only a comparitively small number of criminals involved. Before I retired, I worked in the criminal justice system and my last research project was actually to analyse motivations, etc of the known burglars in our area. There were, indeed, relatively few and most of them were prolific. My work was linked to us trying to secure funding for intense supervision of them when they were released from prison (the vast majority of burglars, quite rightly, get long sentences).
They fell into two broad categories – those who committed the crime to fund a drug habit and those who sort of regarded it as their “work”, generally otherwise having what most folk would think of as pretty normal lives. The first group can be chaotic in life and in their offending but the second can be very, erm, professional. They tended to be the ones committing lots of crimes and, frankly, are very difficult to catch – they don’t leave evidence at the scene and are skilled at quickly converting stolen good into cash, so there is rarely evidence for a prosecution, regardless of how hard the police may investigate.
I’ve been retired for some years now and the various anti-burglary projects were spearheaded by the then Labour Home Secretary (can’t recall name). But it was all part of a strategy to target burglars on a multi-agency basis – police, courts, probation, prisons, local councils, voluntary agencies. It needed that sort of national push and, within a couple of years, the number of burglaries fell. Maybe time to try it again?
Theft Act 1968
Maximum sentence for burglary of a dwelling 14 years
Any other building 10 years.
No deterrent if a “police cautions” is all the punishment.
In some case this may be apt, but the hardened criminal looks at as “Getting off”.
It’s the good honest people who need looking after not the criminals
John – could you please point me towards your evidence that burglars are only getting “cautions”. It would seem to run completely contrary to my own experience of working in the field, so I’d be very interested to see what it is. Thanks.
By the by, I’m somewhat surprised that you say that a caution may be apt in some cases. I doubt whether your view would find much support in the community. It certainly wouldnt from me – adult burglars deserve to be in prison. No exceptions! Sentencing is different for minors but I’d still reckon most underage burglars should also be serving a custodial sentence.
Obtained by the BBC via a Freedom of Information request
Police forces across the east of England have issued cautions for arson, house burglary, fraud and child abuse through prostitution or pornography.
They say cautions are only issued for serious offences after discussion with the Crown Prosecution Service and with consideration for the wishes of the victim, history of offending and “gravity of the offence”.
Thanks, John.
Perhaps thankfully, we don’t live in the east of England and should reasonably expect our local burglars to get a custodial sentence. I really do struggle with the idea that those authorities think that it may be “apt” (your word) to only issue a caution. I really cannot envisage a situation where a house burglar is only cautioned – when I was working, there was only one offender I knew who had not served a term of imprisonment and had been given a period of probation supervision. This was a man who had split up from a relationship and burglared the house he had shared with his then partner to retrieve goods that were his. Unusual circumstances and you have to trust the judge’s decision on the facts but I’ve always thought he was a lucky man.
By the by, Google turns up this BBC news report where a man had been initially cautioned in the east of England but that was later withdrawn with the man being subsequently convicted and imprisoned. Good result, IMO. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-essex-25882415
Here’s the BBC report that John referred to. It dates to 2013 and shows that cautions for serious offences were very limited as you might expect.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-22335575
A quick Google suggests that, following a review of the caution system by the Ministry of Justice, it would now be even rarer for a caution to be issued for serious offences – for example, where the offender had severe learning. difficulties (where even I’d agree custody who seem to be very inappropriate in most scenarios)
So, I think we can generally be confident that convicted burglar is now going to see some time behind bars.
Now, all we can do is hope that the government can be persuaded to spend some more of the budget on the issue of burglars. In the belief that it’s very difficult to catch and convict the prolific ones, I think that money need to spent on rehabilitation – so that, when they come out of prison, society will have done as much as we can to divert them from returning to crime.
Apologies for “going on” about this at some length but, having twice been a victim of burglars, I want something effective to be done and locking them up just isnt enough.