DAY 40: TVP work with MOD to eliminate people walking their dogs near livestock in West Oxfordshire

The Cherwell and West Oxfordshire Local Policing Area (LPA) began the Force’s winter phase of the 100 days of action to tackle rural crime.

Once again, each of the rural policing areas within the Thames Valley will conduct five days of intensive, proactive policing activity devoted to tackling the crimes which effect the farming and agricultural communities.

While the operations throughout the summer concentrated on communicating with the farming communities, raising awareness of the work we are doing and sharing specific crime prevention advice  to help you protect your land and business premises, the winter phase will focus more on the criminal offences and the people who commit them.

Your local police officers will be targeting offenders and suspicious people and vehicles conducting high visibility patrols, particularly during the dark evenings and mornings, and there will certainly be opportunities for partnership patrols between Thames Valley Police officers and farmers, land owners and game keepers.

Today saw the Banbury Rural Neighbourhood officers team up with the Ministry of Defence at Barford St John and patrol the area to try and eliminate people exercising and running their dogs in the fields where livestock are being kept. Livestock worrying and death as well as hare coursing have been reported in the area recently.

‘

Worrying’ is when a dog attacks or chases livestock in a way that could cause injury, suffering, abortion or the loss of produce.

It is a criminal offence:

• For a dog to be kept off a lead in a field of sheep
• For a dog to worry livestock on agricultural land
• If an owner or person in control of the dog at the time allows the dog to worry livestock on agricultural land

Advice:

Dog owners should remember to keep their pets under control at all times and ensure they are kept on a close lead when walking anywhere near livestock. Farmers, although they may be reluctant to do so, can shoot a dog which is caught worrying sheep and dog owners could be liable to prosecution and a heavy fine!

If you see someone who is walking their dog off the lead near livestock, or see a dog who is being allowed to worry sheep, this is a crime in progress and you can dial 999 straight away.

The team also visited six farms to arrange security marking of tools and garden items for later in the week. To speak to your neighbourhood team, use the postcode search on the website and send them an email, or dial 101 and ask to speak to someone from your local neighbourhood policing team.

DAYS 28 and 29: Loose horses and livestock in Wycombe and the team visit Henley Show

Friday (13/9) saw the fourth day of Wycombe’s 100 days of action stint. Officers met with farmers from another 26 farms today, many of whom were interested in the offers and services available. 13 local farmers plan to take up the CESAR offer, 23 accepted several signs from us and six wish to have equestrian tack marked.

So far this week, officers have only had to deal with one loose horse in the Studley Green area. Most of the neighbourhood team have had training from the Horse Trust about how to catch and secure loose horses that may be causing a hazard on roads. Over the last few months, many rural based officers have also been shown how to approach and catch a horse, scan a microchip and tie up a horse.

For more information on horse health and welfare, visit the advice section of the Horse Trust website

As well as horses, we’ve also had calls about loose cows and sheep in Little Kimble. Thames Valley Police are currently piloting the Green Yard scheme which is a formal system to help police deal with horses loose on the roads. For each horse loose on the road, two officers are required to attend and make reasonable enquiries to find the owner, which could take up hours of valuable policing time!



Back where they belong



Find out more about the Green Yard scheme and how you can protect your livestock on the Thames Valley Police website.

The Buckinghamshire Crime Prevention and Reduction Advisor has now conducted 8 site surveys, with many more planned in the future. This is a free service in which the advisor discusses access control and alarm options, how easy it is to locate tractors and other farm machinery, the benefits of CESAR marking and Selecta DNA property marking.

Selecta DNA is a fantastic covert marking system which allows forensic scientists to identify exactly where property, that suspects have touched, has come from. In other words, if a criminal steals, moves or buys a stolen piece of equipment, we can prove it was stolen, identify the victim with relative ease and make a prosecution more likely.  Every person arrested and taken to a Thames Valley Police custody is checked for the presence of this substance which is invisible to the naked eye.

If you are interesting in getting your valuables forensically marked for security, wether it’s a mobile phone, hand-held tools or a television, speak to your local neighbourhood team by calling 101. Alternatively, you can type your postcode into the postcode search function on the Thames Valley Police website, find out who your local neighbourhood policing team are and email them with your query.

The vital statistics for Friday in Wycombe are...

26 farms visited

25 crime prevention packs delivered

5 signed up to Thames Valley Alerts

4 signed up to Country Watch alerts

4 signed up to Horse Watch alerts

23 gate signs put up

8 pieces of property marked with CRE mark

4 pieces of property marked with Selecta DNA

6 pieces of tack marked

13 bookings made for agricultural machinery to be marked with CESAR technology

Putting up Country Watch signage in likely...

and unlikely places...



The Wycombe team also visited Henley Show on Saturday (14/9). Property marking, crime prevention advice and sign ups to TV alert and Country watch led the activity for the day. Supt Gilbert Houalla, LPA Commander for Wycombe, joined the team talking to many members of the rural community.



Supt Houalla meeting the locals





The team are now going through the many questionnaire sheets collected over the past 5 days and will be re-arranging visits to complete site surveys, tack and property marking and arranging a CESAR marking day, keep an eye out for the alert!

Officers across the area continued to visit farms and rural locations to deliver Country Watch crime prevention packs as in previous days.

During the past five days of the Wycombe 100 days of action, over 100 farms have been visited and had country watch packs delivered, crime prevention advice given and those not already in the system have been signed up to TV Alert and Country Watch.

Meeting the rural community....

and their owners...

Sergeant Kevin Read, Neighbourhood Sergeant for the Bourne End and Wooburn, Marlow, South West Rural and Stokenchurch neighbourhood teams said of the last week’s activity: “The feedback from the rural community has been very positive this week with many new contacts made.

“The follow up visits and property marking will enable the team to build on these contacts and hopefully build up the community’s confidence in our abililty to tackle rural crime moving forward.”