EXCLUSIVE:’Thieves have threatened to set fire to our cars and rape our wives’-Retail workers share incidents at special community meeting held in Elm Park to tackle prolific shoplifting.

‘It’s not acceptable that the businesses and the residents of Elm Park have to be subject to this’–Jon Cruddas MP

“Everyone here can tell daily horror stories of what we have experienced due to shoplifters. Staff have been threatened by thieves saying they would set fire to their cars or rape their wives”,were the words of one retail worker in Elm Park after daily shoplifting incidents.

A special meeting took place on Friday 22 March in the Elm Park shopping area to discuss the spate of prolific shoplifting and the plans on how to tackle the problem. The meeting was organised by Labour Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Dagenham and Rainham, Margaret Mullane and Jon Cruddas MP. It included ward Councillors Barry Mugglestone, Stephanie Nunn and Julie Wilkes. It was also attended by the Havering Neighbourhoods Superintendent Simon Hutchinson and managers of the shops that have suffered.

Staff have reported ten incidents a day in certain shops where thieves arrive with large holdall bags and blatantly fill them up and walk out the store. Shop workers have also stated that they do report incidents on 101, but it can take very long periods to get through.

The accounts from staff of the shops told of theft, verbal abuse, intimidation and threats of violence from shoplifters. All agreed that there has been a large increase in incidents over the last two months. 

 It was agreed that the police do a fantastic job in Elm Park but need further resources and that due to staffing issues, the police have to prioritise calls where even greater risk is involved.

Superintendent Hutchinson spoke openly and frankly about the staffing challenges the area has had and agreed that Elm Park needed police presence to tackle daily incidents such as these.

Councillor Barry Mugglestone encouraged staff to report all incidents so that police can see exactly what is going on daily at the local shopping area. He is also part of the shop watch group so can assist staff when needed.

Jon Cruddas spoke with staff to give them his full support and said: “It’s not acceptable that the businesses and the residents of Elm Park have to be subject to this.

 We agreed a series of actions and measures that we believe will help tackle this criminal activity:

• The Superintendent and I will be writing to the head office management of the large stores calling for greater security support for their local stores, for example security guard presence and measures such security glass to protect staff.

• Shops must report all incidents to the police so that the police can be aware of the levels of crime.

• The police will reinforce their policing of Elm Park by redeployment from another area.

• There is an aim to bring facial recognition technology by May alongside action weeks targeted at repeat offenders.

• Setting up a joint whatsapp group for shops and the police to communicate regarding perpetrators.”

Jon went on to say “The solution to this problem isn’t just about policing, vital as that is, it also requires multi-disciplinary work with local authority, community groups and councilors.I do agree and support the calls from shop staff formore bobbies on the beat as a deterrent.

We also agreed at the meeting to convene a follow up session in 6 to 8 weeks to see if the planned actions have had a positive effect and reduced crime. ” 

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