Residential Burglaries 2018/2019/2020 (936A/20)
Request
- The number of home burglaries reported broken down by month for the years 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 to date.
- The value of items reported stolen broken down by month for the years 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020 to date.
Response
Our data are not organised in such a way as to allow us to provide this information within the appropriate (cost) limit within the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act (see ‘Reason for Decision’ below).
Although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the Freedom of Information Act, as a gesture of goodwill I have supplied information, relative to your request, retrieved before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded (see enclosed). I trust this is helpful, but it does not affect our legal right to rely on the fees regulations for the remainder of the request.
Question 1:
| Month | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 |
| January | 1331 | 1752 | 1336 | 1398 |
| February | 1141 | 1462 | 1171 | 1195 |
| March | 1074 | 1354 | 1388 | 1003 |
| April | 1249 | 1123 | 1201 | 727 |
| May | 1229 | 1134 | 1147 | 646 |
| June | 1277 | 1209 | 1028 | 723 |
| July | 1261 | 1404 | 1091 | 807 |
| August | 1267 | 1429 | 1121 | 927 |
| September | 1400 | 1371 | 1177 | 902 |
| October | 1457 | 1672 | 1129 | 958 |
| November | 1739 | 1850 | 1220 | – |
| December | 1474 | 1622 | 1392 | – |
| Total | 15899 | 17382 | 14401 | 9286 |
Question 2:
We are unable to provide an accurate record of the value of items stolen for the following reasons:
- On many occasions a burglary which is attended by Police may at the time have items unknown that have been stolen. As distressed householders are too panicked to have a proper look for things that are missing. So initially they may see that something big like the TV is missing, however weeks later they realise that in fact a small item of jewellery has also gone. That is why it is customary to update the crimes modus operandi / or investigation notes with any further property which is missing or indeed found. This would not amend the initial value field reported at the time.
- Often people do not know the value of a stolen item so it is not recorded
For the above reasons in order to get an accurate value of good stolen (which is an ever changing figure as victim’s change and amend their investigation), every record would have to be accessed in order to evaluate the items stolen. As there are thousands of records to look at this would exceed the 18 hour’s time frame within the Freedom of Information Act.
Attachments
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