DAY 42: Rural crime prevention event at Countrywide Chipping Norton

Last Wednesday (11/12) PCSO Angela Alford from the Banbury Rural neighbourhood team hosted a crime prevention event at Chipping Norton’s Countrywide store. 

Giving advice: PCSO Angela Alford talks to local people about crime prevention

Crime Prevention at Countrywide Chipping Norton

“It was a successful day offering crime prevention advice and giving out lots of farm packs and information; particularly a lot of advice on shed and garage security” said Angela. “I spoke with people from the Banbury area and people who live further out in West Oxfordshire who had seen the Thames Valley Alert for the event and decided to come in and see so it was a very well attended event.”

 

The Thames Valley Police website has recently been updated with advice around building security including, outbuilding, farmhouse and general home crime prevention.

Meanwhile, PCSO Lana Smith visited Crouch Farm with the area’s Crime Prevention and Reduction Adviser Jayne Taylor and security marked several items for the owner. 

Security marking at Crouch Farm

If you are interested in security marking your property, you can get in touch with your local neighbourhood policing team either via email (use the postcode search function on the website to find your local team) or call 101 and ask to speak to your local neighbourhood team.

In the meantime, the CRE-Mark and Smartwater websites can offer some advice about unique security property marking. 

Valuables can also be registered on the Immobilise website. Immobilise is a national database all police forces use when they have found stolen property. If your stolen valuables are registered on the database you are more likely to have them returned to you, if they are recovered by police. You can register all sorts of valuable property on the site and it is free to use!

DAY 26: Mounted section help spread the rural crime word around Wycombe

Today’ s operation was once again spread around the whole Wycombe area, advising farmers, business owners and employees and even delivery drivers about the importance of calling police if they see anything suspicious.

The Local Policing Area Commander, Superintendent Houalla, also joined officers and visited farms and businesses in the North Dean and Lacey Green areas, reaffirming the need to call police on 101 if there is anything that causes concern. He was very keen that those he spoke to make full use of the rural crime reduction services and marking systems that we offer.

The mounted section (horses to you and me!) were also part of today’s operation, patrolling around Speen and Loosley Row and spreading the rural crime prevention message. By a stroke of luck they were close to a primary school at home time, making the day of the children leaving school!



A CESAR marked tractor



The local newspaper was also involved and will be helping to spread the message that the High Wycombe’s Rural Police teams take rural crime very seriously and local people are being actively encouraged to call the police if they suspect criminal activity. Police will attend and deal with those suspected of being involved in criminal activity very robustly.

Tips to consider: 

• Have you spoken to your employees about reporting suspicious activity? Young workers may be particularly apprehensive about reporting suspicious activity just in case in turns out to be nothing. Remind them it doesn’t matter if it does turn out to be nothing, police officers will decide and deal appropriately. Nobody will get into trouble for having a hunch!

·         If you see anyone acting suspiciously, don’t approach or confront them, particularly if the perpetrator is seen to be hare coursing or poaching with firearms. Call police straight away instead.

·         When reporting a crime or suspicious activity details such as exact location, direction the offenders travelled off in, how long ago you saw them and descriptive details like height, build, clothing, hair colour, skin colour, car registrations are all really helpful to not only help officers find them but link other jobs that have been called in if the descriptions match

The Wycombe team’s numbers for Thursday’s operation are as follows:

31 farms visited

28 crime reduction packs delivered

20 people signed up to Thames Valley Alerts

24 people signed up to Country Watch

11 signed up to Horse Watch

54 Country Watch gate signs put up

14 items of property marked using CRE Marking

15 items of property marked using Selecta DNA

190 pieces of horse tack marked and...

23 pieces of agricultural machinery marked using CESAR!

If you are interested in security marking your valuables, you can do so via the immobilise website. Police forces across the country check stolen items they find on the immobilise website to try and trace the real owner. So if your property is stolen, police have more chance of getting it back to you once it is found.

Find out more about securing farming tools and property on the Thames Valley Police website.