Knife crime down and rape prosecutions up
Thames Valley Police have published the latest statistics showing progress being made by the Force to tackle knife crime and sexual violence.
The following was published by the Force on 29th April showing the activity from the last financial year, from 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024:
It has been another busy year with over 400,000 calls to 999, over 470,000 calls to 101, and over 108,000 online reports to our contact management centres.
We have attended 160,000 incidents, made 33,000 arrests, and helped find 5,687 missing people.
On top of that, we policed the King’s Coronation in Windsor, which was another of the most significant policing operations in the history of the Force, additionally we helped people to stay safe at many other events such as Reading Festival, Royal Ascot and Henley Regatta.
Knife crime and serious violence
We are continuing our work to stop the devastation that knife crime and carrying a knife has on our communities.
We have been working hard to reduce serious violence and knife crime on the streets of the Thames Valley, with a reduction of knife enabled crime by over 10% year on year, we have also seen a reduction in homicide.
We continue to play an active role in the Thames Valley Violence Prevention Partnership, working with partners to prevent young people being drawn into crime and violence, which includes proactively working with schools to speak to young people, as well as visiting sports and local community groups.
Through Hotspot Policing and the use of technology, we are putting our officers into those areas where violence is most prevalent, providing a high-visibility deterrent to crime and taking strong proactive enforcement.
Operation Deter has been implemented across the force to ensure there is a swift consequence for those aged over 18 arrested for knife crime. So if someone is arrested over the age of 18 with a knife they will be charged, remanded and put before Magistrates, within 48 hours.
We are also expanding the ActNow approach for those under 18, seeing a rapid response from Youth Offending Teams to support young people and provide intervention.
So if a person under the age of 18 is arrested with a knife, they will be brought into custody and within 90 minutes they are seen by Youth Offending Team caseworker to engage with them and divert them. A further meeting is also held within 48 hours with the young person’s parents or guardians.
Additionally we have continued to target those who run County Drugs Lines through our Drugs and Serious Organised Crime teams. We have seen a 25% increase in people arrested for drug trafficking. This is down to the proactive work by these teams to bring county lines drug gangs and dealers to justice.
Violence against women and girls
Our relentless pursuit of those who seek to carry out violence and sexual violence against women and girls, has seen our charge rate for rape offences increase by 17.4% and for other sexual offences, the charge rate has gone up by 13.6%.
Project Vigilant continues to be utilised across the Thames Valley with over 280 deployments this year.
The project uses a combination of uniformed and plain clothed officers to carry out patrols in public areas outside nightclubs, bars and pubs, to identify people who may be displaying signs of predatory behaviour, such as sexual harassment, inappropriate touching and loitering.
Project Vigilant which was developed by Thames Valley Police is now seen as national best practice and has been adopted by other Forces across the country.
Domestic abuse accounted for 9,253 of all arrests made between 1 April 2023 and 31 March 2024 in the Thames Valley, which equates to 28% of our overall arrests.
We have seen a reduction in formal outcomes for domestic abuse. This is due to a reduction in the use of out of court disposals where there is no sanction on the offender. We are now focused on charging or giving more conditional cautions to offenders, which better protects victims.
We have also seen significant sentences handed to child sex offenders, for example a 27 year sentence was handed to a Slough man who was found guilty of 18 serious child sex offences, another man from Oxfordshire was sentenced to 19 years for multiple counts of rape and other sexual offences.
Roads police
We continue to work proactively to reduce serious injury and death on our roads. Sadly, there have been 58 deaths on our roads. We are again using proactive hotspot policing to reduce casualties and catch offenders particularly of the fatal four.
As a result, our officers have dealt with 14,132 people for speeding, driving without due care and attention, not wearing a seatbelt, driving without insurance and driving while distracted (using a mobile phone). A further 157,103 people were caught speeding by a traffic camera. (note figures are for calendar year ending 2023)
Additionally, a further 4,303 people were arrested for drink or drug driving (figures from financial year to April 24).
We will continue to proactively enforce and educate road users around the four fatal driving offences of speeding, not wearing a seat belt, driving while using a mobile phone and drink and drug driving.
Recruitment
We have recruited the highest ever number of police officers over the past year, as we continue our focus on creating a diverse work force which reflects the communities we serve.
Our work force is made up of 9,270 officers, staff, PCSOs and Specials, with 48% female and 52% male. Meanwhile, of the 522 officers recruited in 2023-24, over 40% were female. Additionally 6.1% of new recruits were from an ethnic minority backgrounds.
Chief Constable Jason Hogg, said:
“I am extremely proud of all our officers, staff and volunteers, who are working to make the communities we serve in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire safer.
“We have made significant progress in reducing serious violence and homicide, and I am also proud of the progress we have made on tackling violence against women and girls.
“We have arrested over 30,000 people, responded to more than 160,000 incidents, and we have responded to over 950,000 contacts from the public. We have also made strides to reduce fatalities and serious collisions on our roads. Further, we have supported thousands of victims and have put more defendants through the courts.
“There is always more we can do, and this year I really want for us to solve more crime and bring more offenders to justice, especially in crimes such as burglary, robbery and shoplifting.
“Everyday I am reassured that we have the right people in Thames Valley Police, and we are continuing to recruit the right people, to create a police force that is trusted by our communities, but also reflects the public that we serve.”
Numbers at a glance
984,280 total contacts from the public – increase of 2% from 2022/23
404,654 calls to 999
471,512 calls to 101
108,114 online reports – an increase of 15% from 2022/23
638 missing people found deemed ‘high risk’
160,127 incidents attended
33,006 arrests made
755 knife crime arrests
9,253 domestic abuse arrests
6% increase in personal robbery (1,022 incidents to 1,088)
3% increase in residential burglary (4,942 to 5,075)
17.4% increase in charges for rape offences (121 to 142)
13.6% increase in charges for sexual offences (426 to 484)
