Provision of information held by Northumbria Police made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the 'Act')
As you may be aware the purpose of the Act is to allow a general right of access to information held at the time of a request, by a Public Authority (including the Police), subject to certain limitations and exemptions.
You asked:
- I would like to know how many mobile phones have been stolen in Newcastle city centre in the past 3 years? And which month and year has had the most reported cases?
- What is the ratio of reported cases of phone theft versus those who have been caught and punished for this specific offence?
In Response:
Following receipt of your request, searches were conducted with the Corporate Development Department of Northumbria Police. I can confirm that the information you have requested is held, in part, by Northumbria Police.
I am able to disclose the located information to you as follows.
The following should be noted with regards to the information provided below:
- As a specific date period has not been requested, this data has been run for the past three years exactly. This pertains to the period 26/02/2017 through to 25/02/2020.
- "Theft of a mobile phone" is not an offence in its own right. As such, this has been defined as a theft, robbery or burglary wherein the item taken was a mobile phone. Should one such instance relate to multiple mobile phones being taken, they have been counted individually.
- "Caught and punished" has been defined as the initial theft having a final disposal of a charge or summons.
- "Newcastle City Centre" has been defined as within the Newcastle Central area code on the force system.
- Regarding the ratio – this is not recorded and we are not obliged to create data in order to provide a response to a Freedom of Information request - as such the base data has been provided.
The most prolific month was November 2017 with 188 total reported thefts, and the most prolific year was 2017 also with a total of 1246 reported thefts.
2017 |
Mobile Phones Stolen |
Charged/Summonsed |
Feb |
0 |
0 |
Mar |
14 |
4 |
Apr |
120 |
8 |
May |
114 |
6 |
Jun |
78 |
4 |
Jul |
114 |
2 |
Aug |
168 |
2 |
Sep |
114 |
4 |
Oct |
158 |
0 |
Nov |
188 |
70 |
Dec |
178 |
4 |
Total |
1246 |
104 |
2018 |
||
Jan |
156 |
20 |
Feb |
130 |
8 |
Mar |
147 |
12 |
Apr |
53 |
2 |
May |
74 |
1 |
Jun |
63 |
3 |
Jul |
53 |
0 |
Aug |
47 |
0 |
Sep |
44 |
0 |
Oct |
98 |
0 |
Nov |
58 |
0 |
Dec |
103 |
4 |
Total |
1026 |
50 |
2019 |
||
Jan |
85 |
0 |
Feb |
78 |
1 |
Mar |
91 |
18 |
Apr |
57 |
7 |
May |
59 |
2 |
Jun |
52 |
2 |
Jul |
61 |
8 |
Aug |
48 |
5 |
Sep |
67 |
3 |
Oct |
71 |
0 |
Nov |
50 |
2 |
Dec |
55 |
5 |
Total |
774 |
53 |
2020 |
||
Jan |
47 |
0 |
Feb |
105 |
2 |
Total |
152 |
2 |