Criminals toast a merrier Christmas

FOR criminals, Christmas is increasingly the time to be jolly, after research revealed a surge in the number of robberies, burglaries and thefts over the festive period.

Analysis of 2016’s crime statistics shows that each day of the holidays, thieves committed an average of 448 burglaries, 65 robberies and another 1,082 thefts.

The number of thefts over the festive period in England and Wales climbed from 5,524 in the financial year 2015-16 to 6,278 in 2016-17. Robberies rose by 20 per cent from 770 to 918 and thefts rose 22 per cent to more than 15,000 over last year’s holiday compared with 12,398 the previous year.

In recent weeks, police have urged families not to advertise valuable gifts by putting packaging on the street for refuse collection.

The data from Freedom of Information requests by the Liberal Democrats comes as a survey by the police watchdog found more than half the public have not seen a single officer on patrol in their area in the past year.