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Each month Seargent Blight will be giving us an update one what the communtiy support officers and beat managers are doing to help reduce and be proactive about local the local community, making is a feel safe be safe environment.
July Press Release
Evening all! Showing my age there, but a bit of nostalgia never hurt us and so far we are still having a lovely summer reminiscent of '76. Remember what I said last month though, although crime is low at the minute, keep those doors and windows shut and locked if you're not in or sunbathing round the back.
Well I have fantastic news for you this month. We have now arrested a man from Liverpool in connection with the abduction and sexual assault, in May, of a young girl in Fleetwood. He has been charged with the attack and is currently remanded in custody awaiting trial, which is testament to the effort we put in to the enquiry and to the help you all provided.
We have, throughout June, continued to work to resolve the PACT Panel Priorities which are set twice a month and are based on what you have asked us to focus our attention on. You can see the current priorities on the Lancashire Police website, but one of them is about too many people riding bicycles on the pavement in the town centre.
As a result, the town centre Community Beat Managers, PC Rachel Bibby and PC Oliver Maughan, along with their PCSO's have issued a number of fixed penalty tickets. However, we are still seeing many people riding there without consideration for others so we will continue to enforce the law in this area.
A bicycle with all of its pointy hard metal levers, bars and pedals travelling at two or three times walking pace, colliding with someone exiting a shop is going to hurt!
In addition to this, our community team in the Broadwaters area, PCSO Lisa Gornall and PC Kevin Berry, were being inundated with calls about bad behaviour, noise and damage all coming from an address on Laurel Avenue in Fleetwood.
Lisa spent a great deal of time listening to residents and other people badly affected by the problems and as a result of the evidence she gathered, PC Berry successfully argued at court for an Anti Social Behaviour Closure Order to be issued. This meant that the people responsible for causing such misery to their neighbours had to leave the house almost immediately, which was then boarded up to prevent their return. The result has been a much improved and much safer area in which to live.
We are now monitoring other addresses in town that cause similar problems, which affect the health and well being of their neighbours. We will seek to get those that insist on behaving so badly, removed from your communities, so that you can enjoy your home lives in peace.
We have also executed a drug warrant at an address on Hatfield Avenue and we continue to look for any information that will help us target other addresses in the town. We will not tolerate this drug dealing, which destroys the lives of our children and is the root cause for most stealing and burgling.
As ever, if you have any information that will help in our fight against crime or disorder, you can call Crimestoppers for free and anonymously on 0800 555 111. You may even get a reward.
Sgt David Blight, Fleetwood Neighbourhood Policing Team.
June Press Release
Hello again. As I write this it is a glorious summerŐs day outside and we have a lot to look forward to in our social lives. The World Cup is upon us and hopefully we will do very well, I have my own prediction in mind but I wont jinx it here.
However, with this summer weather and distractions like the World Cup and other family events and holidays, it is worth reminding everyone to keep a good eye on your belongings so that it doesnŐt become someone elseŐs.
When you park that car, close all the windows and sunroof and lock it. Similarly when you leave your home, even if it is only for a few minutes (or if you are out sunbathing in the back), lock all your windows and doors. It takes merely seconds for someone to nip in and take your hard earned belongings, while you nod off in the sun or run over the road to that ice cream van.
Thankfully, this sort of crime is rare here now, but letŐs keep it that way and not get complacent.
So what have we been up to this past month in your Neighbourhood Policing Team?
You will all, no doubt, be aware of the despicable crime committed in Fleetwood on Sunday 9th May when a young girl was abducted and assaulted during the afternoon.
You can be reassured that this is an extremely rare crime, thankfully.
We have a massive number of police officers and staff working tirelessly, to catch this man and I am confident, having seen the major incident room in action, that we will catch him.
Our Neighbourhood officers have been working day and night in Fleetwood assisting on the enquiry.
We have been in and around every primary school in town with a highly visible presence to reassure children and parents and have been in all of the schools to remind everyone of the Stranger Danger message.
We have conducted a massive trawl of the town identifying every private and publicly operated cctv system in all relevant neighbourhoods. We are continuing to pump huge amounts of resources into identifying and bringing to justice the offender.
You can rest assured no stone will be left unturned.
However, there have been some instances, where innocent members of your community have been spoken to as part of the investigation. These are perfectly normal and standard enquiries and it is important, in order for us to be able to focus fully on catching the offender, that people do not make assumptions about those people we speak to or cars we may examine.
We are in a position to quickly rule out anyone or anything not involved. If we have returned property, not arrested someone or released somebody we had arrested, then they are not connected with the crime and I would plead with you not to jump to conclusions. All this will do is cause us to have to move some of our resources away from catching the offender in order to investigate these errors in judgement.
In the meantime we have also continued to work to resolve the PACT Panel Priorities which are set twice a month, as I mentioned last month and these have now just been updated.
You can see the new ones on the Lancashire Police website but briefly they are:
Undesirable groups and anti social behaviour at the shops on Chatsworth Avenue at weekends in the evening. Undesirable groups of youths, noise, litter and broken glass on the grassed area at Greenfield Road, causing upset and fear to the residents. Cycling on the pavements on the town centre.
The top one was there last month and we are continuing to resolve peopleŐs fears. We have worked hard over the last year to resolve what was a problem here last year and we have seen big reductions in anti social behaviour as a result. The CBM, PC Ian Lester, has targeted specific families involved and he continues to do so. We have recently conducted a survey of the area and it seems that we are achieving our aims but that most of the concerns are relating to a fear of things going back to how they were last summer.
The off licence there has had itŐs licence renewed by the council but with stricter conditions and we will continue in our work to ensure this area remains safe and trouble free.
The two other priorities are new for the month and will stay for the next two months while we work to resolve them. The town centre CBMŐs, PC Rachel Bibby and PC Oliver Maughan, along with their PCSOŐs will be conducting a fortnight of education and warnings in the area, to rid the pavements of anti social cycling. After that time, anyone found committing this offence will be issued with a fine. It is a simple thing for people to use the roads or back alleys to ride their bikes. The town centre pavements simply cannot safely take their traffic.
As ever, if you have any information that will help in our fight against crime or disorder, you can call Crimestoppers for free and anonymously on 0800 555 111.
Sgt David Blight, Fleetwood Neighbourhood Policing Team.
May Press Release
Hello, allow me to introduce myself, I am Sgt David Blight and I run the Fleetwood Neighbourhood Policing Team.
By way of introduction, the team consists of 4 Community Beat Managers, or CBMs, who are all Police Constables, and 9 Police Community Support Officers, or PCSOs.Fleetwood is split into 5 council ward areas.
Each ward has a CBM and a PCSO allocated to it who will manage the Anti Social Behaviour and associated offences such as Criminal Damage. They will also deal with more long term problems relevant to particular communities. Our overriding aim being, to make Fleetwood a safe place in which to live, work and play and to help achieve this, my team are responsible for engaging with you fully and providing a visible presence in your communities. My intention is to write a brief article for this magazine each month in order to highlight to you the work we are doing in order to achieve our aim and to tackle the problems you are telling us about. It will also be an opportunity to let you know the results we are having in making Fleetwood safer.
As a department we have been talking to you more and more and listening to your concerns. In the early summer we altered our shift patterns to double the numbers of Neighbourhood Policing Officers on duty every weekend in the evening; this being the times of your biggest problems. We have targeted persistent offenders; those who refused to accept good advice and/or help. Many of those individuals have, as a direct result of our targeting, been sent to prison over the course of the last 12 months. But conversely several of those we targeted did in fact take on board the advice and help and have stopped re-offending against you.
In addition to providing a highly visible presence in your wards, we also provide a structured programme of educational inputs into the high schools in the area, to steer young people away from the temptation to commit crime or get involved in Anti Social Behaviour. These lessons reach every child in Fleetwood at some point in their education. We are currently looking to extend this into all primary schools in the near future, with an emphasis on personal safety and respect.We work with a great many partner agencies, such as Wyre Borough Council, the schools as mentioned, health services and housing agencies to name but a few, in order to resolve the issues that arise.
We also act on all information we receive and have conducted many search warrants throughout the year, for example closing down 2 cannabis factories which had been set up in town centre rental properties.
We will continually strive to improve the safety of Fleetwood in everything we do and we look to you to help us do this. For example we very recently conducted a survey of all the residents in the area of the Memorial Park and as a result have embarked on an operation to work with parents and youth groups to deter large groups of youths gathering there and provide them with more constructive outlets and activities in the town.You can assist us in our ambition to make Fleetwood as safe as possible, by attending any of the regular PACT Meetings which are held every month in each ward area, full details of which can be found at the police station or on the Lancashire Constabulary Website. If you cannot get to the police station and have no internet access, you can telephone the department direct on 604911 and leave a message and one of my team will call you back within 24hours with the information. This is not a staffed number so do not use it if you require the police to attend more urgently than within 24hours. If this is the case call 0845 1 25 35 45 or 999 in an emergency of if a crime is being committed. As ever, if you have any information that will help in our fight against crime or disorder, you can call Crimestoppers for free and anonymously on 0800 555 111.
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