POLICE, CRIME AND ANTI-SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR UPDATE 19 JANUARY – 1 FEBRUARY 2022
CRIME STATS There has been a slight increase in crimes reported in the last 2 weeks at a total of 294 crimes. However, this could be due to the relaxation in covid rules allowing
for a rise in the volume of people hence more reports. There have been 51 incidents of antisocial behaviour reported, showing a decrease from 65 in previous weeks.
NATIONAL NEIGHBOURHOOD POLICING WEEK Last month, the Bristol central neighbourhood police team were together with other neighbourhood teams across the force involved in conducting a series of mini-policing operations during the week 17th23rd January. This gave police officers and police community support officers alike an excellent opportunity to concentrate on tackling several different issues and priorities affecting the city centre area. These were planned activities in response to reports from concerned members of the public and business premises in the city.
Policing activities included targeting offenders of many different kinds such as persistent shoplifters, traffic-related offences on E-scooters, inconsiderate delivery moped riders, taxi-related breaches, drugs suppliers and also Project Servator deployments (antiterrorist, reassurance patrols). Various tactics from education, engagement and enforcement were utilised as appropriate and the week was an overall success. We look forward to running more productive operations such as these in the future.
INTELLIGENCE-LED OPERATIONS During the most recent Neighbourhood Policing Week, we have run a series of operations targeting our most prolific shoplifters within the city centre. After identifying whom we should target, we ran both a uniformed and plainclothed police operation. This was very successful where we arrested two of our main targets in the act of committing theft. They were charged with the offence of theft. This also resulted in one individual receiving an immediate 14 Week Custodial Sentence and being issued with a Criminal Behaviour Order (CBO)
banning them from the city centre area for 3 years. The other positive result we had was identifying and arresting an offender who was targeting one specific shop, we again caught him in the act of committing theft and he was arrested for 17 outstanding thefts, they have been charged to court and are currently awaiting sentencing. Following positive results from our targeted, intelligence-led operations, we plan to continue conducting these through the oncoming year.
TACKLING TRANSPORT-RELATED ISSUES The recent e-scooter trend presents dangers for road users and members of the public with numerous reports of near misses and accidents. Privately owned escooters can be used on private land but not public roads, cycle lanes, pavements or public spaces. A city centre operation resulted in three e-scooter seizures, multiple warnings and a publicity exercise to highlight the issues.
The new year is often a busy time for emergency services. January saw the Neighbourhood Police Team adopt a proactive approach to tackle current issues.
An accompanying taxi operation resulted in one vehicle driven by an unlicensed driver, one driver not displaying his taxi plates and multiple warnings reported to the Licensing Authorities. A further operation to tackle the illegal use of mopeds by delivery drivers in the Broadmead proved very successful.
SECURITY MEETING For many years the Police and the BID in conjunction with Cabot Circus have held a monthly security meeting. This meeting is so important for us to manage those causing the most harm to you as local business owners. This meeting allows us to identify the most active criminals and links into our internal process to allocate officers to bring these offenders to justice to reduce business crime. It also allows for you to share experiences with your community which together makes us stronger. During COVID these meetings have been held online and the attendance has shrunk, with the past few having no attendance. Moving forward we are going to go back to an in-person meeting. Details will be sent to you
through the BID. Can I please ask that we start to see our business community back at this meeting. Together we are stronger, together we can tackle business crime. The next security meeting will be taking place Thursday the 3rd March. You can register here.