Mobile phone thefts (FOI ref: 1425A/24)

Request

I would like to be provided with:

1) A table showing the total number of reported phone thefts for each month from the start of 2023 up to now.

2) The top 20 streets/locations for reported phone thefts, including the total number of thefts at each location (please could street names/locations also include town/city)

Response

Please find enclosed our response.

1) A table showing the total number of reported phone thefts for each month from the start of 2023 up to now.

2) The top 20 streets/locations for reported phone thefts, including the total number of thefts at each location (please could street names/locations also include town/city)

Over the past two years we have run numerous operations to reduce the theft of mobile phones, both during pickpocket style offences and robberies which have led to reductions across the force.

The theft of mobile phones often involves young people and we extensively work with young people, both with our schools’ officers offering crime prevention advice in their local inputs as well as targeted social media engagement across a range of channels where we know young people will see our messaging.

Please note that these data should be interpreted with caution. Comparing numbers of incidents/crimes can be misleading and does not necessarily indicate the likelihood of someone being a victim of crime. In addition, the number of incidents/crimes recorded in an area over a period of time can be influenced by a number of factors. Consequently, statistics on incidents/crimes for one period may not necessarily be a good indicator of future incidents in that area.

Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from a number of data sources used by forces for police purposes. The detail collected to respond specifically to your request is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are considered when interpreting those data.

The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of relevance of data to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures for ad hoc requests may have limitations and this should be considered when those data are used.

If you decide to write an article / use the enclosed data we would ask you to take into consideration the factors highlighted in this document so as to not mislead members of the public or official bodies, or misrepresent the relevance of the whole or any part of this disclosed material.