Metal Theft Update for Local Churches
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THEFT FROM CHURCHES SAM DOBBS Daventry District Sergeant Telephone 03000 111222 Extension 343805 | Mobile 07712 193705 Email | [email protected] Twitter | @sgtsamdobbs GPMS | Not protectively marked ‘BRAIN-DUMP’ on CHURCH METAL THEFT Sergeant Sam Dobbs | Daventry Police | March 2016 Why I’m writing his document is provided to serve as a follow-up and update for the successful metal theft/heritage crime seminar held at Althorp House at T the end of 2015. As you may know, the seminar attracted considerable media interest, and pulled together in one room a large number of interested parties, including many local church people, as well as officers and staff from the policing family, and representatives from the security and insurance industries. I also hope that this document assists others who were not present at the event, so in giving an update, I may go over ground that we covered at the seminar. There’s a lot of ground to cover, so you may need a few cups of coffee or glasses of gin to sup whilst reading. But I hope that the context will be helpful so that as an interested party, you are fully briefed and informed on metal theft from churches. I hope to cover the following basic areas: Why I’m writing this report Similarities, differences and lessons from 2007 The current problem Responses to the current threat Offences in Northamptonshire Prevention, Roof alarms and EIG Police response to roof alarms and 999 calls Assessing whether you need a roof alarm Steps you can take if you cannot afford an alarm Target hardening and crime prevention I should stress that this document is not intended to be text-book material on the subject – I have described it as more of a ‘brain-dump’ on what I know and have learned in the past while. I am in touch with (and am grateful to) leading people in the Diocese of Peterborough, as well as in the security industry as well Directors at EIG. I also liaise with Geoffrey Probert at the Suffolk Historic Churches Trust – an absolute wealth of information and ideas on theft of metal and protecting churches. And of course, with local contacts I keep in touch with lots of local church folk and ministers through Archdeacon Richard Ormston and Rural Dean Stephen Trott, which gives access to the Diocese, General Synod and Heritage England. I don’t profess for this document to be squeaky clean corporate or spun. Reality tells me that these thefts from churches are not priorities for policing. Despite being massive in terms of value and impact, they are low in numbers in each county and too low to feature on the all-crime radar. However, they have massive impact on rural crime, perceptions of crime and often show how better we could do policing when criminals rely on the complications created by our borders or regional boundaries to move between the counties and desecrate our places of worship. Sgt Sam Dobbs | ‘Brain-dump’ on church metal thefts 2 GPMS | Not protectively marked Introducing me am not a specialist in investigating heritage/rural/metal crime. I am a neighbourhood police sergeant with Northamptonshire Police and my patch I covers the Daventry District – one of the largest council districts in England with around 70 parishes. Of those parishes, only four are not rural, and we have a small and enthusiastic team of local officers and response officers. In my previous role, I was Staff Officer to the Chief Constable and in that role I had a fair amount to do with the last spate of metal theft in and around 2007, when the metal market in South-East Asia in the approach to the Beijing Olympics, which may explain my current interest and involvement with the problem. At that time, I worked closely with the Diocese of Peterborough and its Archdeacons, and presented to many groups of church folk on how to protect their churches. Since then, I have moved to the Daventry District, which is the area where I live and go to church myself. I am an organist and PCC Secretary and have served on Brixworth Deanery Synod. My benefice is one of six churches. In the past ten years, two of those churches have been burgled and we have been victims of three metal thefts with lead being stolen from the roof. I have written Faculty applications and seen the pain, hassle and worry caused by these crimes. With my family buried in the churchyard, I have some real empathy and ownership. I ‘get’ the angst caused to the local community, (churchgoing or not,) by an attack on our beautiful and much-loved village churches. In many cases, they have stood for hundreds of years as places of sanctuary, protection, forgiveness, solidarity and where many families and friends have come together to see life begin, end and where lives are joined. Without wishing to sound twee, I have stood in a church and marvelled at the legacy I have inherited, thinking of the hundreds of thousands of people who have stood in my footsteps in the hundreds of years past, and I baulk at the duty we all share in passing on the baton to next generations. The mists and peace of my twee reflection are then shattered when I look up to see the skies through the holes in the roof after thieves have desecrated a holy place. So I am no expert on this stuff, other than that which my personal experience and twenty five years of policing give me. For better or for worse, I get sent or copied in on oodles of emails on the subject (because I took an interest) and have to weave this stuff into my day job (where there is a natural fit but always more demand than capacity). It has taken me two months to sit and write this. All that is a long-winded explanation or maybe an excuse for not having responded in a timely fashion to many of your emails asking for assistance or advice in relation to protecting churches. I hope this update makes up for that. Sgt Sam Dobbs | ‘Brain-dump’ on church metal thefts 3 GPMS | Not protectively marked Is history repeating itself? n opening the seminar at Althorp, Andy Frost, our Deputy Chief Constable, and lifetime local resident, mentioned the differences between the 2007 I epidemic of metal theft and the current one. In 2007, demand for metal on the Asian markets ahead of the Beijing Olympics saw a spike in metal values, set against a relatively unregulated scrap metal industry. It opened up the opportunity for petty criminals and more organised gangs, to steal any amount of metal. We saw thefts from church roofs, for sure, but also manhole covers, street signs, flashing from houses, farm gates – anything that could be sold for cash and melted down. It’s what Angus Brown from Ebound security calls the ‘white diamond and packet of fags’ crimes – thefts to score a quick win. I remember St Matthew’s Northampton being hit by teenagers who cut off the lead flashing they could reach, for a quick £200. We caught them, yet the penalty was minimal. However, there was also a concerted attack on churches. Claims for metal theft from churches rose exponentially and in a way that the insurance industry could not manage. Churches were soft targets, as they were difficult to protect, there were no bespoke security products invented, they were/are largely remotely situated, used rarely and victim of the sadly naieve paradigm that ‘nobody would steal from God’s house, surely?’ As a result, the main church insurers, including Ecclesiastical Insurance Group (EIG) took steps to control and limit claims (and, therefore, premiums). Working with Smartwater, a forensic marking solution, every church was given protective advice and cover was reduced to £5k (increased to £7.5k from 1/2/15) for churches protected by Smartwater. No theft of metal cover is provided if Smartwater was not applied, registered and signage displayed. This now meant that if a church was attacked, it would be church reserves, not insurance companies, which would have to swallow the average £20-30k losses from an average roof metal theft. At St Mary’s East Haddon, we were attacked twice in a week. The total loss of lead was valued at around £4-5k but to us the total loss was around £15k due to the collateral damage to masonry and architects requirement to reconstruct the vestry roof at a different pitch. After the Beijing Olympics, the metal market slumped and the problem appeared to reduce. Most churches had by now done something to become more secure, if only by way of vigilance and security plans. EIG beefed up its crime prevention service to PCCs and offered regular site surveys. At one of my churches, we linked exterior movement detectors to our existing intruder alarm, installed a mobile phone link, so that our lead was protected. We gained no additional insurance cover from that, but we would know (and could therefore minimise loss) if someone was on the roof. For interest, this cost around £1.5k in 2008. Sgt Sam Dobbs | ‘Brain-dump’ on church metal thefts 4 GPMS | Not protectively marked Shortly afterwards, Government introduced legislation to regulate the scrap metal industry. It made it difficult (though not 100% impossible) to exchange scrap for cash. Monies now have to be paid into bank accounts and identification verified. Police checks of scrap metal dealers were built into everyday policing activity. This had a considerable impact on the problem, but just as shotgun regulation does not stop the criminal acquiring a gun on the black market, there are still outlets in the UK, if not in readily-accessible Europe to which metal thieves can resort.