Nearly 90% of bike thefts unresolved in last three years
Posted on in Cycles News , Outdoor News
An investigation by the Daily Telegraph has found that, in the almost 24,000 neighbourhoods where there has been at least one bike theft since June 2019, 87 of cases have been closed without a suspect being identified or charged.
The investigation also suggested that the national average for a suspect being identified and charged was just 1.4% in 2020, down from 2.8% in 2016. Some 4,000 bicycles were reported stolen in Cambridge in a typical year — with many more thefts going unreported — making it the UK's bike theft capital when considering how many bikes are stolen per head of population.
Local cycle campaign group Camcycle estimated theft of bicycles – the most reported crime in the city – cost residents more than £1.5 million.
According to the investigation, 98.8% of 1,992 bike thefts in central Cambridge over the past three years had gone unsolved, while in Borough & Southwark Street, in London, there had been 591 unsolved thefts out of 603 reported (98%).
The neighbourhood of North Laine and the Lanes, in Brighton, had 400 unsolved thefts, Petersfield in Cambridgeshire had 296, Hammersmith Broadway had 193, Central Islington had 168 and Richmond Central 165.
When the analysis was extended to larger districts, housing 7,000 to 10,000 residents, 70% of areas with at least one bike theft had not seen a single case solved between June 2019 and May 2022.
As reported in Road.cc, the investigation followed shortly after research by cycling insurer Bikmo hat reported bike thefts had fallen for the fifth year in a row, with a 10% year-on-year decline in 2021 alone.
That research was in line with early-year figures from 40 UK police forces, published in February, which showed a fall in bike theft by 11.5 per cent in England, Wales and Northern Ireland compared to in 2020.
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