burglaries in Forest Hill/East Dulwich areas

[Penguin68]

It is very easy to be 'statistically responsible' when you are not sitting in the midst of the statistics - if you've been burgled (or mugged or whatever) not only are you experiencing a 100% incidence, but any news of anything similar happening reinforces your own fears.

It is known that such things as burglaries do actually 'cluster' (i.e. it's not a statistical anomaly) - burglars will recce an area, see where it's vulnerable, and then turn-over as many houses as possible in a short time before security is improved. I have already noted on an earlier post that burglars will also revisit a burgled house once the victim has replaced lost goods so that they can then steal virtually new DVD players etc. So individuals may well feel that that they are in the middle of an epidemic of crime and be right so to do - whilst only streets away nothing much is happening, and the district 'average' remains steady and low. That may be because little localised pockets of crime are actually the norm, so from one period to another little seems to change, once outcomes are 'smoothed' over a wide enough area. Nobody publishes crime stats for a 6 or 7 figure post code for you to really compare your immediate locale now and e.g. 6 months ago.

Personal experiences of being in the midst of a crime wave may be accurate, but the wave may be one in a very small pond.

[louisiana]

Taking the number of burglaries per ward per month, for three of the relevant wards, and comparing to the number of households reported as being in each of those wards, gives an annualised figure of around 1.5-2.8% of households burgled each year depending on ward. (That would pan out at 1-2 houses being burgled in my street every year.)

That's a very rough average, and of course some homes may be much more likely, and others much less likely, to be burgled, owing to location, security measures, presence/absence of owner, presence/absence of large fierce dog etc.

And how is it spread geographically? We know that some burglars seem to hit in several properties in a street in succession, or in neighbouring streets.... So there's an impression that there's a lot going on, perhaps?

It's difficult to avoid taking into consideration what happens in one's own street. So if you know your near neighbours have been burgled, you know there's a burglar or two that's been walking past your house and perhaps assessing it. Which does make you think.

And yes, edresi10 is probably right, people want to vent.

From what James said about what is classified as a burglary, it seems unclear whether some offences may be perceived as 'burglary-type' by the burgled, but defined as something else by the Met; and it may be that attempted burglaries do not count. Then there other types of home-related events (e.g. threatening person on doorstep) that perhaps meld into someone's perception of 'home invasion', but clearly do not count as burglary. So people's experience of what they see as 'threats to their home' may differ to some degree to what the stats say.

[concita]

Your suggestion that I am a little crazy is abusive. I dont't criticise people on the forum and how you dare to offend me?

My only intention to start the thread on this forum it was to alert people. Other areas have crime cascade, so everybody knows what is going on. Why not on ED forum?

[SeanMacGabhann]

Before you get all offended Concita reneged your last post accused me of not being in touch with reality.

[Jeremy]

Actually I think that if threads like this keep people alert and prompt people to beef up their home security, it's probably a good thing.

My comment about "the correlation between active EDF members and posts about burglaries" was just meant to illustrate that the more members we have, the more reports we'll hear. If we could draw a graph, it would probably be a 45 degree line. So although it's good to alert people, there's no evidence we have a crimewave on our hands.

[James Barber]

At last nights Dulwich Community Council the East Dulwich Police sgt. stated that burglary now is halve what it was three years ago. It is a low rate BUT any burglary is at best grim for the victims.

As so many involve forcing sash windows we're thinking of arranging free sash window restrictors. Watch this space.

[edresi10]

concita Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Your suggestion that I am a little crazy is

> abusive. I dont't criticise people on the forum

> and how you dare to offend me?

> My only intention to start the thread on this

> forum it was to alert people. Other areas have

> crime cascade, so everybody knows what is going

> on. Why not on ED forum?

Concita- I was not abusing you in teh slightest, if you botehers to read the post I was defending you. Its perfectly acceptable for you to be a little crazy given the topic tht is being discussed, and I was merely pointing out that people should take that into account in the thread, that you arent perhaps as rational as others at the moment because of the experience you have been through. As others have already pointed out victims of crime have a much narrower perception of what is going on around them.

[cate]

SeanMacGabhann Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Before you get all offended Concita reneged your

> last post accused me of not being in touch with

> reality.

What the H does this mean?

[SeanMacGabhann]

Typos abound there. I was asking Concita to read her last post as it accused me of not being in touch with reality (essentially, mad). But her subsequent post went on the attack saying how offended she was that people were suggesting she wasn't in touch with reality. Basically she gives it but can't take it

[tallulah71]

James Barber Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I'm really sorry to hear that you've been burgled

> and especially that you've lost irreplaceable

> items of sentimental value.

>

> But, the latest Met crime stats for the 12 months

> up to the end of September 2010 compared to the 12

> months up to end of September 2009 show a decrease

> in crime locally and similar burglary rates.

>

Perhaps you should read the 2 threads started this week with the words 'mugging' and 'car theft' in the titles. I bet they'd be delighted to read your little statistcs.

> That isn't to say we shouldn't all be vigilant.

> But crime levels locally are slightly down in

> total and burglary at the rate of 11 per 1,000

> population per year or 1.1%.

[louisiana]

SeanMacGabhann Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Typos abound there. I was asking Concita to read

> her last post as it accused me of not being in

> touch with reality (essentially, mad). But her

> subsequent post went on the attack saying how

> offended she was that people were suggesting she

> wasn't in touch with reality. Basically she gives

> it but can't take it

Spanish has a useful distinction between being as in current (often temporary) state or feeling, and being as in part of your character/permanent.

I think when peeps have been talking about the first, other peeps may interpret it as the second, and feel aggrieved. Possibly being not totally in touch with reality (allegedly) wrt a certain issue doesn't make you (ongoing) mad, and feeling upset (temporary) about being burgled doesn't make you crazy (permanent).

[James Barber]

Hi tallulah71,

The two threads you've mentioned about a mugging and a car theft took place in Peckham Rye ward. Also another thread about Solway Road in Peckham Rye ward. Terrible that they have occurred and they all sound appalling. They don't change the fact that East Dulwich ward is now statistically one of London's safer wards and places to live, visit, work or study in.

That is of no comfort if you become one of the very few victim in our area.

When I became a councillor Peckham Rye ward was statistically safer than East Dulwich ward - as indeed was South Camberwell ward. Partly due to so many shops and the crimes they attract on Lordship Lane and partly because East Dulwich was a forgotten area. Since being elected I've ensured with my ward oclleagues that we've arranged for siginficant investment in crime prevention. The Police Safer Neighbourhood Teams have been created for every ward but only East Dulwich SNT Police team has been given all the capital funding for crime prevention that they've said they need to reduce crime. I've spent a lot of time bouncing ideas with them of how we can reduce crime further.

In that time I've also applied for crime prevention funds for South Camberwell ward and Peckham Rye wards and every time those local councillors have said no. I've even suggested they change the applications to appear to come from them as I've done for other schemes in Labour held wards to make them palatable.

East Dulwich ward now has less crime than those wards. Its a straight political choice to use Cleaner, Greener, Safer funding to make the area Safer or Greener or Cleaner. The balance between those goals is a local political choice.

In East Dulwich we're passionate about the Safer to a great degree than others.

I'm chuffed to say that passion has rubbed of with Lib Dem colleagues in the north of the borough who have funded many thousands of property marking kits.

[DJKillaQueen]

Why do you have to make every issue a political comment on you vs labour James? You guys lost conmtrol of the council for a very good reason. I'd like to have seen that 100 million you guys wasted on a call centre go on many things of which making local neighbourhoods safer would have been an option.

FYI the Peckham Rye SNT do an excellent job and it is a very safe ward to live in.

[louisiana]

Hi James

You often refer to wards further north in the borough (not related to East Dulwich)...but never (ever?) to College ward right here in East Dulwich. I live in SE22 (East Dulwich). I live in College ward.

Some of the burglaries that have happened have been in roads 1 minute walk from my front door. Lordship Lane Estate is in College ward. Dawson's Heights is in College ward. Our shopping area is Lordship Lane etc. etc.

Could you please put College ward on your radar when you are talking about 'neighbouring' wards to your own? We are East Dulwich too.

Ta

[james84]

James, Stop banging on about East Dulwich ward, commentators on here are users of the forum and not neccissarily from your ward. You seem to have some sort of issue about trying to prove how good you are and how good you have been in comparison to some over your counterparts in other wards. You keep going on about your marking kits and all you have done locally, which is great, but not everything is aimed at you, at does not continuously need to be related back to your ward.

Oh by the way you may want to get your facts straight- you claim ED is one of the safest wards in ED, well putting that into context of this thread and your own figures, ED ward had the 4th highest residential burglary rate in Southwark in September. Maybe your beloved property marking kits arent doing aswell as you like to maintain.

To be honest this threas has probably run its course now, and done the job of raising awareness in the local wards, but I agree with some of the previous posts that we dont need to keep on about this as though it is a massive issue. There are burglaries in this area and always will be, but it is by no means a rampant problem that should scare people. Its just something that people should be aware of and act accordingly, and not use the issue to scare or score some chief political points.

[Huguenot]

Eh? East Dulwich Forum, he represents East Dulwich Ward and he's not allowed to talk about it?

If councillors from other wards don't comment on here then that is their problem, not James'. You can't ask James to talk about other wards, and it's completely unreasonable to ask him not to comment because your own councillors are so crap they won't get involved.

Sorry you feel bad about it, but write to them and complain, not James.

[james84]

James is my counciller- my point is he is not everyones and so when peop,le are talking from outside of James' ward there is no need to keep coming back to his own ward. The Op is not from ED ward, neither are a few others who have posted. I dont think anyone on this thread has been criticising ED ward in particular- it was James who made it about wards statistics. The point was that these types of crime seem to be on the increase in the area as a whole, as this is the ED forum that constitutes the neighbouring wards also. Howeve that said I do agree that i think it more a perception that it has increased because of the more frequent posts on here, and without this forum there probably would be no issue, but the fact is we have this forum, like it or not and people are going to post things like this.

[DJKillaQueen]

But other ward councillors aren't crap H and James B does use this forum to spout party politics as you well know. In fact, before the Labour councillors my ward has now, councillors that are visible, come to CC meetings and so on, we had faceless LibDem councillors that never went to public meetings.

James should stick to the points in hand or those relevant to the work he does instead of seizing every opportunity he can to dig at the opposition.

[louisiana]

I've come across a lengthy Home Office report on crime stats in England and Wales. A quick skim appears to reveal that...

- just 77% of burglaries with loss are reported. Other kinds of burglaries (e.g. attempted, no loss) have lower reporting rates.

- the police record just about all burglaries with loss that are reported to them. That means if you report it, they will record it.

- consequently, it seems to me that an important factor in police crime stats under-reporting burglaries appears to be people not reporting.

Other issues include...

- thefts from sheds etc only count in domestic burglary stats when the shed etc is physically attached to an inhabited dwelling. So theft from free-standing outhouses such as your tool shed or bike shed don't count. So sometimes what we may count as a burglary may not be counted as such in the crime stats.

- similarly, thefts from common areas of buildings in multiple occupation (blocks of flats etc.) don't count.

- one the biggest factors associated with being a victim of burglary is not having security measures. People with security measures get burgled a lot less. There's a table showing all the different measures used by the general population as compared to those used by victims of burglary (percentages using each measure for both victims of burglary and for general population).

[DJKillaQueen]

Can we have a link to the report?

[louisiana]

It's a pdf on the Home Office website that I don't have an html page link to, but you should be able to grab from here:

http://rds.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs05/hosb1105.pdf

It's 2004/5, so not up to date, but I'm sure the main principles still hold now.

[James Barber]

Hi DJKilllaQueen,

Which ward are you saying you live in that had faceless Lib Dem councillors?

East Dulwich ward has had Lib dem cllrs only since 2006.

Dulwich Village ward has had one Lib Dem cllr elected this May.

Other than that we're surrounded by a sea of Labour councillors and have been for decades with the odd Tory councillor.

Hi louisiana,

Useful report and link. Thank you.

[concita]

Seen on Forest Hill Web site Not even the snow stops these people.

Quote:

Today 08:59 AM

There was a burglary at 6:40am this morning in our street In Honor Oak Park, the guy forced the front door of one of our neighbours (PVC door which had not been double locked so they popped it open with a tool going under just one lock). Our neighbour was inside and she disturbed him but he managed to go away with a laptop, some other goods and her car keys. The police was here at 7am and has now talked to all the neighbours. They said that there has been a increase of burglaries due to a lot of people being recently released from prison for good behaviour (his words). From now on we will double lock at all times (we always double lock at night and when we are not in but now will do 24/7)

SO ALWAYS DOUBLE LOCK YOUR DOOR EVEN WHEN INSIDE!

[shell_8]

Surely this thread has now run its course?

* We all know there have been burglaries

* We all know to be more vigilant

* We all know to report any burglaries or suspicious activity to the police

* We all know it's horrible for those affected

What more is there to be said? Perpetuating the thread can only serve to scare people.

[concita]

Better than sorry.