Police.. is this the norm these days?

JamesM

JamesM

JamesM

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Joined
18 Oct 2002
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Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham
I'll try and keep this as short as possible.

I used to rent my mums house out with my GF last year, it's not in a brilliant area but both my mum and us never had any issues...

Until that is, some unpronounceable decided to steal my mountain bike (including the plastic cover too!) from our rear garden while we were in the house at the time, at night. While they were at it they thought they would take a chance and push up the handle on the conservatory door, luckily it's always locked. It was clear that they had gained access to our garden from the garden behind as the bushes had been pushed back, etc. Informed the police, they came around and took a statement, didn't really seem that bothered, never went round to the house at the back to ask any questions.

Nothings happened for the past 6/7 months, we've moved out and my mum moved back in.

Jump to last night where I get a call from my mum who lives on her own, in a pretty stressed state saying that they have now decided to take her garden table, chairs and parasol :confused: and again have tried to open the conservatory door. This time they have taken it further but attempting to kick in the side passage door, leaving a nice foot print on it and one of the wooden panels in the door has been pushed back. God only knows how they didn't get in as the door is so bloody thin, it's not meant to be an external door anyway but it's something that's never been sorted out since my mum works stupid hours and earns peanuts.

Once again call the police, chap on his own arrives at half 9 and again takes a statement. Seems more interested this time and we point out what's happened. It's now 100% clear (to us) that the table and chairs we're taken through into the garden behind for two reasons.. 1) The mesh/trellace that my mum had put up to stop this has simply been push down, bent over, along with old brambles, rocks, etc all moved out of the way. 2) A piece of plastic relating to the table is found next to this 'hole' which they came through.

Police chap simply says that's all fine but there's no proof so he can't go round :rolleyes: (admittedly its 10pm at this time and I don't expect anyone to go round right away) but are you kidding me?

Not only has someone stolen something from the rear garden yet again, through the same way yet again but this time they take it further by trying to break into the house and you can't even go round there to ask them if they saw or heard anything? I'm not expecting them to go around and arrest the owners, i'm not accusing them of stealing as it may not be them but even still, why can't they just go round and 'investigate' as that's what Police do isn't it?

My mum's pretty shaken, more so because she lives on her own, isn't having a brilliant time at the moment and now it appears that people can quite happy help themselves to stuff in her back garden without any consequences.
 
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Same happened when someone nicked two bikes out our garden. Police not that interested and even indicated that they knew who probably did it - no evidence (i.e the scroat wasn't stood in the street outside my house with the bikes in hand the minute the fuzz came round) so advised us to stick an extra padlock on the shed and left us to it.

Turned garden into fortress - 8 ft wall put in, lights and those nice plastic spikes on the top of the walls and never had a problem since
 
This sounds pretty normal to me, too much time and effort on the police's part to investigate this only for whomever it was to be given community service.

From what I see, the police tend to prioritise crime based on ease of detection, that's why half the constabulary are out in cars or with speed guns catching motorists doing 35 mph. Or that house down the road that stinks of weed, they'll go and raid that.

But with burglary, they'd have to call in forensics which would involve money and effort. Like any organisation their actions are heavily guided by the media/public perception. What's happened to you is unlikely to get in the papers so there's no pressure on them to solve it. Had you been a high street bank on the other hand, it'd probably be headline news in your local paper and got into the national press too, in which case they'd have a team of people down there dusting for finger prints and a spokesperson on standby to reassure the public they are making every effort to catch the perpetrators.

The sooner we do away with police bonus schemes for catching motorists committing minor offences and target crimes based on their severity rather than ease of detection/media coverage, we'd have a better system of public protection.
 
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They'd be very interested if you caught them in the act and put a maglite through their skull though, that's for sure.

******* thieves, I can't stand them.
 
Will be interested to see what Burnsy says...

You could always go around yourself to the house behind, under the pretence of warning them about it? Ask them if they heard/saw anything?

kd
 
Put up a fake external cctv camera
put up a security light
put a real ip camera recording to a laptop in the house in one of the upstairs windows (turn off leds, paint black if it's white).

(note that without expensive certified equipment and signage I wouldn't expect your video to be used as evidence - but it can't hurt).

If you can afford put up a real fence, something that can't be kicked through or easily climbed over.

You aren't going to get retribution or punishment so just aim to make it difficult enough that they go somewhere else.

ps. Do you think it's the house behind - that could just be how they gain access? Either way prevention is better than cure.
 
So do thieves like this ever get nabbed then? I'm guessing that all the local scumbags are known to the police, but if simple burglaries never get investigated....
 
It's not the police that are always at fault. It's the system in general.

Was talking to a friend whose in the police force and he was telling me how it's mostly getting anything done to people who've blatantly committed crimes. One of his examples was a guy who pulled up at a set of traffic lights on a moped with his phone in his hand texting. He represented himself at the hearing and walked away with nothing because "They couldn't figure out whether he was using it while he was driving"

Stupid system.
 
@Telescopi
You dont need signs for domestic use.

I've buried planks with 6 inch nails in our borders. As we were burgled a few years ago. Got the scroat on CCTV but it wasn't clear enough to charge. The next time we'll have clear DNA proof.
 
Kamwah said:
It's not the police that are always at fault. It's the system in general.

Was talking to a friend whose in the police force and he was telling me how it's mostly getting anything done to people who've blatantly committed crimes. One of his examples was a guy who pulled up at a set of traffic lights on a moped with his phone in his hand texting. He represented himself at the hearing and walked away with nothing because "They couldn't figure out whether he was using it while he was driving"

Stupid system.
Click to expand...

Then maybe the police should start concentrating on real crimes instead of silly things like the above.
 
estebanrey said:
Then maybe the police should start concentrating on real crimes instead of silly things like the above.
Click to expand...

Yea because theft where usually no-one gets hurt is more of a 'real' crime unlike the guy who crashes into a driver of someone on their phone which could mean anything from injury to death.


mattyg said:
@Telescopi
You dont need signs for domestic use.

I've buried planks with 6 inch nails in our borders. As we were burgled a few years ago. Got the scroat on CCTV but it wasn't clear enough to charge. The next time we'll have clear DNA proof.
Click to expand...

People kept jumping over my GF's parents fence to nick stuff from the sheds. Put some bits of woods with nails sticking out on top of the fences.
 
So it is the norm then, just bugs the hell out of me that they can't even spend 5 mins just asking a few questions.

Well drove to the station to see if we could at least get them to pop round and ask a few questions. Was told that we can only speak to the person who's investigating the case and that as he's not on shift till 10pm tonight we will have to call him then...

Mum's looking into getting some barbed wire along with using a load of garden rubbish, branches, etc to block up the hole but if they are determined then they will just cut the wire and pull it all down again. She already had brambles, thorns, etc placed along the top of the original, albeit damaged fence (which by the way, was done by them too) but they simply pulled/kicked it off to get through this time.

Have ordered a fake CCTV camera for the rear garden.

Just drove past the two terraced houses which share the garden. Both look run down to hell and the side gate is wide open. Either it's them and they are moving the stuff on asap and selling it or they don't give a monkies and allow anyone into their back garden to cause trouble.

Shame she can't move really.

My son told my this morning that the kids who live in the house to the rear actually go to his school and are in the year above him. He also said that on a 'bring your bike to school day' the lad also brought in an orange and black bike.. what a coincidence that the one stolen from the garden was also black and orange :rolleyes:
 
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A lot depends sadly on resources sadly. I work in Shrewsbury and the other night there were just 4 officers for the whole town...with a population of near 100 000 people. Current government cuts I'm afraid
 
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