Police turn spotlight on car-key burglars (From Basingstoke Gazette)

Police turn spotlight on car-key burglars

12:10pm Friday 6th March 2009 in Local By Vicky O'Hare

A CRACKDOWN on car-key burglaries is being stepped up by Hampshire police as part of an ongoing operation to catch burglars.

Operation Nemesis has seen 567 suspected burglars arrested in Hampshire since January 5, in connection with 968 offences in homes and businesses.

Twenty-four per cent of those arrested have been charged with burglary-related offences.

This pattern is also being repeated in the north and east Hampshire operational command unit – of which Basingstoke is part.

In the four-week period to December 28, 2008, there were 160 house burglaries in north and east Hampshire.

The four weeks since the start of Operation Nemesis saw a reduction to 106 burglaries and the latest figures show they have fallen to 75 in the period to February 12.

Officers are now highlighting the growing problem of car key burglaries – where the target is keys for the householder’s car.

There has been a significant rise in this kind of offence in the last year – and Basingstoke is one of the hardest-hit areas. High-performance cars such as BMWs, Volkswagens, Mercedes and Peugeots are the usual target.

During the coming weeks, Police Community Support Officers will be leafleting car owners whose vehicles are most at risk from car-key burglaries.

During January, 12 car-key burglaries were reported and a further 15 have been reported during February in the north and east Hampshire areas.

Detective Chief Inspector David Annets, Operation Nemesis lead for north and east Hampshire, said high-performance cars are often the vehicles of choice for organised crime gangs, and some are stolen so the parts can be sold on.

“The easy access to the north-east of Hampshire from London and the rest of the country via the excellent road network means that those houses nearer to the M3 corridor are more at risk, particularly in the Blackwater, Farnborough, Aldershot and Basingstoke areas,” he explained.

He added: “For the foreseeable future, officers will also be routinely stopping many high-performance vehicles that they see travelling on the roads of north and east Hampshire after midnight in order to deliver this crime safety message, and to check whether the vehicle has in fact been stolen.”

Operation Nemesis also seems to be having the desired deterrent effect, with house burglaries for Hampshire as a whole plummeting from 591 in December last year to just 376 in February.

Non-dwelling burglaries fell from 975 in January (the start of the campaign) to 674 by the end of February.

Detection rates for dwelling burglaries have also more than doubled since the start of Operation Nemesis.

The operation continues until the end of March, combining crime intelligence and other police resources to help prevent burglaries and arrest culprits.