By Inspector Maxine Cilia, Spelthorne Borough Commander
My top tip for February, get to know your local neighbours. I was surprised in some commu-nications from members of the public in the local community that they had never spoken to their neighbours. By knowing your local community you can look after each other’s proper-ty, recognise strangers and support those who are vulnerable. This is how Neighbourhood Watch Works by encouraging people to look out for each other and report suspicious incidents. After 40 years, it still works. For more information please visit https://www.ourwatch.org.uk/ We are still seeing an uplift in motorbikes and scooters being stolen. If you have a motorbike or Moped please think about its security. The link below will give you full details how it safe; https://www.surrey.police.uk/cp/crime-prevention/keeping-vehicles-safe/theft-motorcycles-scooters/. Our vehicle crime and catalytic converter crime has also remained much lower now. We have not seen any hot spots for this crime type this month, however Shepperton has seen an increase in vehi-cle number plates being stolen. These are stolen for a number of criminal reasons. Please report to us so we can flag your number plate in case it is cloned. If your plate is on with simple screws, change them. We have a large supply of tamper proof screws available. Just speak to one of your PCSOS or contact us through the website https://www.surrey.police.uk/contact/af/contact-us/ Please remain vigilant and do not confront suspects committing these crimes as they can be violent. Staines Town Centres is still experiencing high anti-social behaviour from youths. Over the Christ-mas period this involved the throwing of eggs at members of the public and although we have al-ready put a number of measures in place, we still need more reporting and identification of individu-als concerned, so that ASB letters can be served – working towards CBOs (Criminal Behaviour Or-ders) if they do not change their behaviour. Numer-ous young persons have been stopped and will be receiving letters from us to their parents and a visit. The throwing of eggs has also been experienced by members of the public at Sunbury and PCSO Wa-ters and Gibbons have been out in the Community working to identify the youths who are from all over Spelthorne and bordering areas. The last thing I would like to talk about is Romance Fraud. The City of London Police as figures show almost £92 million has been lost nationally through dating scams this year. Daters who strike up online rela-tionships between Christmas and Valentine’s Day tend to be most susceptible to romance fraud. The National Fraud Intelligence Bureau (NFIB) report-ed seeing a spike in reports shortly after these ‘relationships’ are likely to have begun (last year, 901 reports were recorded by the NFIB in March). The campaign aims to reach both potential victims and relatives and friends of potential victims. In Surrey, we have seen 290 reports of romance fraud between November 2020 and October 2021, with a combined total loss of £1.7m. 60% of vic-tims were men, and the most common victim age range was between 50 and 59 years old. If you know someone who’s online dating on line or you are there are some simple tips to stay safe below Ensure your friends and family have adequate privacy settings on their social media accounts so strangers can’t access their personal information. Stay in regular contact with friends and family who are online dating to help spot any changes in behaviour or things that don’t seem right. Make them aware of the signs of romance fraud so they are conscious of the tactics that criminals use to carry out these scams. Reiterate that you should never transfer money to someone that you have never met in person. Encourage people to report to Action Fraud and the police if they have become a victim of romance fraud and not to be embarrassed about doing so. You can find information on safe dating advice available on the Online Dating Association’s web-site: www.onlinedatingassociation.org.uk Please keep reporting to us. We need your infor-mation to fight crime . We may not respond to you directly but we will get to know about the infor-mation and be able to manage our patrols and work in the local area based on your information. Contact as above or on our social media pages at Facebook via chat function @Spelthorne Beat or call us on 101. You can even report anonymously via Crimestoppers https://crimestoppers-uk.org/ or on 0800 555 111.
Maxine Cilia – Spelthorne Borough Commander