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Operation Munich was born after hauliers in North Yorkshire fell

6th December 2001
Page 42
Page 42, 6th December 2001 — Operation Munich was born after hauliers in North Yorkshire fell
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Which of the following most accurately describes the problem?

victim to an unusually high number of nocturnal thefts. Adam Hill reports on how good, old-fashioned detective work eventually snared a determined band of villains.

North Yorkshire is a place of blunt talkers, beauty spots and 6,000 miles of roads. Early this year it was also the location of an alarming number of thefts from curtainsiders. The crimes— more than 90 reported in the three months to 10 May alone—took place on or near the Al. The cost to the haulage industry ran into thousands of pounds.

This main road runs from London, hundreds of miles to the south, through Nottinghamshire up to Pontefract and Sherburn in Elmet, skirting Ripon on its way through Catterick. To the west are the Dales, to the east the North York Moors.

Remote lay-bys and drivers hours' regulations proved attractive to thieves keen to target vulnerable drivers forced to pull over in out-of-the-way places to take statutory breaks. Working mainly at night, thieves were driving up to parked wagons, slashing the curtains and taking goods, often while the drivers slept.

At Sherburn in Elmet, police sergeant Steve Smith was perturbed. It was obvious that the crimes went beyond what might normally be expected from a few months in spring. Treating the incidents initially as a local investigation, Smith soon realised that the problem went much further. Ron Johnson, spokesman for the North Yorkshire police, takes up the story.

"The Al goes through the middle of the county with pull-off stops," he says. Smith identifed a problem area along the road from the Markham Moor roundabout in Nottinghamshire to Scotch Corner and set up a surveillance operation which took in West Yorkshire and extended down into Nottinghamshire and even Leicestershire.

Johnson says: "It was a case of a local sergeant seeing crimes happening, they snowballed, and he realised it was bigger than he first thought."

There was certainly no pattern in terms of the goods stolen; lawnmowers, washing powder, coffee and wire were all among the targeted loads. But there were just too many of them to smack of

pure opportunism. A gang must be at work. Operation Munich—no significance to the title; operation names are issued centrally and that one was next on the list—was born.

Perhaps the most important aspect of the operation, apart from the subsequent prosecutions, was the liaison between police forces. Smith was supported by his superiors in approaching counterparts beyond the county boundaries. Johnson says: "Once someone takes the initiative, co-operation is good.' But it's a bit of a chicken-and-egg situation, he admits—you need links to get cooperation and without co-operation you can't get the links. Several weeks of painstaking work by Smith and DC Gary lent followed, identifying the problem, gathering the intelligence, and targeting specific suspects.

Despite their efforts, in the best tradition of detective fiction, the piece of evidence which sealed the case came by chance from a passer-by. He saw the gang leaving a lay-by after stealing a load of vodka and had the presence of mind to take the registration number of the getaway car. With this information the police were able to make the arrests.

Crime spree

Smith's original hunch had been proved right. The villainous quartet were from Knottingley and Pontefract—just south of the area between Leeds and Selby where many of the offences took place. Whatever else they did, the thieves cannot be accused of laziness: charges were brought for 60 offences in the threemonth spree by the four men. The twentysomethings—Stephen Bentley, David Walker, Jason Wilby and Graham Burden—were jailed for three years, two years, 21 months and 15 months respectively after pleading guilty at Teesside Crown Court. Since the men were sentenced on 28 September, truck crime on the Al has dipped markedly. As Smith said: "The team of criminals were not simply opportunists but professional and determined thieves who were prepared to travel over 100 miles on any one night to commit these crimes."

Benefits

Eradicating this type of crime is hard: as long as there are loads to steal there will be people to steal them. But the actions of North Yorkshire police—and of officers Steve Smith and Gary lent in particular—show that there is a willingness to tackle wrongdoers who make life unpleasant for honest toilers using the county's roads. Smith concludes: "I hope by taking this team out of action we will have made a real difference from which the general haulage industry will benefit."

It is not so much that stolen property worth 270,000 was recovered. More importantly, it shows that the force's credo, "to reduce crime and the fear of crime", is clearly not just aimed at protecting people who live on the patch. Johnson says: "Forces are realising that you can't look inwards. A lot of our criminals are not resident in North Yorkshire." Co-operation will continue, he insists. And for professional drivers who pass through a variety of enforcement areas carrying out their daily duties, that is welcome news.


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