Inspector Andrew Smith from the Met Police Croydon South Neighbourhoods team has written and asked us to circulate the following message:
Over the evenings of the 11th – 13th February officers from your local teams and supported by officers from specialist commands within the Metropolitan police ran an operation targeting motor vehicle crime.
We are aware that this is an issue that has often been raised to us and we want to reassure you that we are taking your concerns seriously.
During the three nights we recovered 5 stolen vehicles and returned them to their owners, one of these vehicles was stolen just an hour before hand.
Another was a recently stolen van full of parcels that were out for delivery, the van had false number plates on it but proactive actions by officers identified its true identity and arrested the driver for theft of a motor vehicle. The van and its contents was returned to the owner.
Another vehicle was identified as driving on cloned number plates and the driver has been prosecuted, the impact of their actions in driving with duplicate number plates was that an unsuspecting owner received a large number of ULEZ and congestion charge fines despite never having driven in the London area.
Whilst motor vehicle crime continues to be a big issue across the borough lots of work is being done in the background to identify criminals who want to steal cars and bikes.
May I take this time to encourage you to visit Secured by Design – Vehicle Crime where there is a wealth of crime prevention advice.
I would encourage the use of steering locks as a hard protective measure, this unfortunately will not prevent all thefts but the more physical actions you can take the better.
