Been burgled? Wiltshire Police pledge to attend all domestic burglaries

Wiltshire’s new Chief Constable, Catherine Roper has made burglary one of her key areas for operational delivery. This follows and is in accordance with a review by the College of Policing, the National Police Chiefs’ Council which requested all forces attend all home burglaries.

Wiltshire Police have joined the national pledge to commit to this and we are currently attending all domestic burglaries. In addition to this domestic priority, during April, Wiltshire Police attended all reports of burglaries in progress and all non-dwelling burglaries (i.e. at business premises). Between March and May this year, 288 burglaries were reported across Wiltshire, the Force’s area of operation.

Temporary Assistant Chief Constable Dave Minty said: “Victims of burglary will often suffer with long-lasting impacts – knowing that someone has violated your home can often affect victims far beyond any financial damage caused. 

“Our mission is to Keep Wiltshire Safe and this means helping people feel safe inside their own homes as well as out in our communities.

“We know that ensuring our officers attend burglaries at the earliest opportunity will not only provide reassurance, but also increase the chance of preserving potential evidence which could support a prosecution. Evidence also suggest this early attendance can deter future crimes in the area.

“There are occasions when our attendance at domestic burglaries might not be recorded as 100% but this is due to factors such as duplicate crime logs being created, the incident later being assessed as another crime type or where the victim has asked us not to attend.

“We are confident that our actual attendance rate is 100% for home burglaries and we will consistently strive for this to continue.”

Burglary has become a touchstone issue for Policing recently. A report in ‘The Times’ on Tuesday of this week (6 June ’23) (see panel) detailed how in ‘nearly half of areas in England and Wales’ Police had failed to solve a single burglary for the past three years.

For information on how to protect your home from crime, click here to visit the Wiltshire Police information pages.

If you have suffered any crime, click here to report it on the Wiltshire Police website.