90% spike in robberies

A teenage gang was blamed for a spike in robberies on Leeside as new crime figures were revealed this week.

Robbery from a person saw a 90 per cent increase in the past year with Superintendent Colm O’Sullivan giving details about the rise from 40 during January to September 2018 to 76 for the same period this year.

During a Joint Policing Committee meeting on Monday, he said: “The rise was driven by a group of teenagers. During the summer, these teenager were responsible for a number of incidents in the city centre and they were identified and (will be prosecuted).”

Speaking about robbery from a person in general, the superintendent said that a lot of incidents were happening between 4-6pm and 9pm-midnight on several city centre streets. These included, he said, Church Street, Grand Parade, Washington Street and Sheares Street.

“That’s where it was predominately happening,” he added.

Reports of property crime were down two per cent overall but there was an increase in some of the different types of this crime including interfering with a vehicle which rose by 26 per cent and theft from a vehicle, up 24 per cent.

Superintendent O’Sullivan said: “These are linked as interfering with a vehicle doesn’t mean that anything was taken from it. A lot of cars aren’t being locked either and are left open. Please ensure that you lock your vehicle and make sure there’s nothing in sight like purses, sunglasses or laptops.”

There’s also been a small rise in the number of thefts of what’s called ‘other property’, from 639 to 656, a three per cent increase.

The Superintendent said that mobile phones were an example of this and warned the public to take mobile phones off tables or bars when socialising or in public.

He explained: “A mobile phone can be worth €600, you wouldn’t leave €600 euro on counter so why do it with a mobile phone?"

Reports of handling stolen property also increased by 48 per cent, from 25 to 37.

Theft from a shop was the most reported crime in this section but saw a decrease from 1,365 to 1,214, a drop of 11 per cent.