‘We’re taking it seriously’: how police in Manchester cut burglaries by third | Police

When Sean Edwards found his car and his neighbours’ houses had been broken into in Longsight, Greater Manchester, in 2022, he was not expecting much from the police based on previous experiences.

“I expected them to dust for prints and take statements, then give us a crime reference number and nothing else happen,” he said.

“Similar had happened before,” he added, but this time, “the policeman who saw us was really good”.

The police took statements and forensic evidence, and also found CCTV of a man using a neighbour’s stolen cards in a supermarket. Edwards’ housemate had spotted someone suspicious at the time, and later identified the burglar from the footage.

The burglar was convicted after pleading guilty.

Successful outcomes like this are more common in Manchester than they used to be. Under the stewardship of the chief constable, Stephen Watson, who took the helm at Greater Manchester police (GMP) in 2021, the force began to take burglary seriously and has cut offences by a third.

Between December 2020 and December 2021, 16,758 residential burglaries were recorded across Greater Manchester. The figure fell to 11,256 last year, a 33% reduction, equivalent to 106 fewer burglaries a week.

During the same period, the number of burglary arrests increased by more than a quarter, and the number of solved crimes almost trebled – from 4.2% to 11.5%.

The force launched Operation Castle in 2021, in which officers attended every reported burglary, a move away from treating such crimes as “volume” or “low level”.

“We weren’t in a good place four years ago,” said Det Supt Alicia Smith, who leads Operation Castle, but now “we are taking it seriously. Police officers love nothing more than to catch a burglar in the act.

“It’s dreadful; people genuinely feel violated, and they should feel safe in their own home. Your home’s your haven, isn’t it?”

The turnaround is in part due to the creation of neighbourhood crime teams, which focus on using community intelligence to target and arrest criminals carrying out burglaries, robberies and car crime.

DI Natalie McDonald said: “[In] our hotspot area, we were getting burglaries every single day.”

With a suspected frequent burglar in custody on remand, “everyone can sleep a little bit easier in the area”, she said. “Burglaries have dropped off.”

McDonald leads a team of detectives based at Longsight police station, just south of the city centre, who are responsible for locating, arresting and interviewing suspects.

Her officers go out into the community, gathering CCTV footage, building profiles of suspects, and linking similar crimes – sometimes even identifying perpetrators from a tiny logo or small flash of colour on their clothing.

Their evidence comes from crime scene investigators (CSIs) as well as primary accounts from response officers and call handlers.

In the 999 call centre at GMP’s North Manchester headquarters, these handlers are often the first person a victim will come into contact with when reporting a burglary.

“It can be hard because people are very emotional,” said Ella, a call handler,adding that sometimes they were on the phone while an intruder was in the house. Recalling one call, she said: “I heard the glass shatter. I heard her scream, and that was just a moment that I will never forget.

“All you want to hear is the sirens pulling up outside, and that is what you listen in the background for, because that’s when you know your job is done. Somebody else is there now to protect them.”

After call handlers, it is often CSIs who are next on the scene; GMP’s decision to go out to the site of every burglary means vital forensic evidence is more likely to be preserved.

The team has also moved to working across the force area, rather than being tied to a particular district, which means that someone can often get there more quickly.

“Not too long ago, I went to a burglary where the whole house had been ransacked,” CSI Hayley Craig said. “There was a large, vast quantity of family jewellery taken.”

When she looked at a first-floor window, she said, there were “what looked like really obvious glove marks on the inside”.

“Now, they shouldn’t be there,” she said. “They’re on a top-floor window, and no one’s climbing in, other than the offenders.

“So I ended up getting a DNA hit from them and finding out who it was, who’d at least come in the window and broken in, and that’s brilliant,” she added. “That’s what we do it for. That’s why we do this job, so we can find those people and hopefully put them away.”

Burglary in Greater Manchester is not a problem solved – the vast majority of reported offences do not lead to an offender being brought to justice. But residents can expect a better response from police than they would have had five years ago.

“There’s always work to be done; we’re always seeking to improve,” Smith said. “But the work that’s been put in place has been really significant, and I think we’re all really proud.”