Operation Target

Organised crime – Operation Target

Serious and organised crime is planned, coordinated, and committed by people working individually, in groups, or as part of networks working across the UK and beyond. While financial gain is often at the heart of the criminals’ network, this can vary depending on the type of crime.

Nationally, organised crime is seen as one of the greatest threats to communities because of the harmful effect it can have on everyone.

West Midlands Police is specifically working to identify criminals involved in serious organised crime and bring them to justice, while preventing people from falling victim to some of their traumatic or harmful crimes. This work is known as Operation Target and is working across our region to make our communities safer places to live and work.

Organised crime can take many forms. One of the features of the groups involved is that they are often involved in several criminal activities, with each crime feeding off the other.

Alongside obvious organised criminality such as drug dealing and the trade in firearms, here in the West Midlands we often see crimes such as the exploitation of children and vulnerable people which can be traced back to organised criminal activity.

As well as pursuing offenders, Op Target is also about ensuring we do everything we can to prevent people becoming victims in the first place. This includes putting activity in place to disrupt organised crime and also through education.

An organised crime group’s activities can span several different crime types, often including:

• drug dealing of substances like cocaine, crack, and heroin
• mass cannabis production
• firearms
• money laundering
• organised immigration crime
• child criminal and sexual exploitation
• county lines
• modern slavery and human trafficking
• organised acquisitive crime
• large scale handling and exporting of stolen goods

Serious organised crime affects people in unseen ways, as well as in some high-profile major crime that hits the headlines. It leads to more deaths in the UK each year than all other national security threats combined, including terrorism. It costs the country at least £37 billion every year.

While serious and organised crime is an international issue, it has a massive impact here in the West Midlands. The region’s population, demographics and transport links mean organised crime has a huge impact here.

The operation spans the wider West Midlands region, with WMP working alongside other forces and our Regional Organised Crime Unit (ROCU) to prevent organised crime and bring offenders to justice. We work closely with our partners and in line with the Home Office and National Crime Agency (NCA) our aim is to reduce the risks and threats from organised crime using the four main objectives:

• prepare – reduce this criminality and prepare for when organised crime takes place
• prevent – seek to prevent people from engaging in organised crime by stopping and identifying those at the source
• pursue – Relentlessly pursue offenders through disruption, targeted action and prosecution
• protect – protect communities, vulnerable people and businesses from organised crime

How you can help

While we are do everything in our power to protect the West Midlands from serious and organised crime we also need support from the public.

Nobody knows their neighbourhoods, towns and cities better than you.

We need you to be our eyes and our ears by looking out for suspicious behaviour that is out of place and spotting the signs of vulnerable children and adults being exploited.

If you think you have information – no matter how small get in touch with us and together we can help to make your community a safer place.

Signs to look out for:

• increase in visitors or cars to a house or flat
• people coming and going at odd times of the day and night
• strange smells coming from the property (illegal drugs)
• windows covered or curtains closed all the time
• cars pulling up to or near the house for a short period of time
• people talking on phones outside the address
• people handling large amounts of cash and owning numerous mobile phones
• unexplained, sometimes unaffordable new things (e.g clothes, jewellery, cars etc)
• an increase in violence at the property or in the area

County lines criminal exploitation

A county line is operated by an organised crime group who use a mobile phone, known as a ‘line’ or a ‘graft’ to extend their criminal activity business into new locations - usually from a city into rural areas. In some cases organised crime groups can target and exploit children, vulnerable adults and disabled people to deliver and deal drugs on their behalf.

Know the signs:

• a child or young person going missing from school or home and travelling to market towns, seaside communities or rural areas
• self-harm or a significant change in emotional wellbeing or their behaviour
• the use of drugs and alcohol
• having more money, new expensive clothes or accessories which they are unable to account for
• having multiple mobiles, tablets or SIM cards and receiving an excessive amount of texts and calls
• forming relationships and meeting with controlling or older people or groups
• carrying weapons
• significant decline in school results / performance
• lone children from outside of the area

There are a number of ways to report information or a crime:

• call West Midlands Police on 101
• call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111
• speak to your local officers
• get in touch through our live chat
• always call 999 if there is a crime in action or immediate threat to life