A five-day operation targeting commercial burglaries, youth and gang crime in Rotorua has resulted in several arrests.
The operation follows an increase in commercial burglaries at night, and vehicle crime that is often associated with these burglaries.
Detective Senior Sergeant Mark Van Kempen says as well as arresting two people responsible for multiple burglaries, seven stolen vehicles were recovered, and 12 youth were either charged or referred to youth aid for a range of related offences.
“It was a huge success for Rotorua, and I have no doubt that a lot of crime was prevented as a result. We’ll be looking at continuing similar operations going forward.
“This gave us a real opportunity to disrupt and apprehend some of those involved in these crimes, and the efforts, while largely at night, were noticed by the community.”
The Tactical Crime Unit were assisted by youth aid, the dog section and community staff. Rotorua Lakes Council provided assistance by use of CCTV cameras to assist Police enquiries.
Van Kempen says bringing the different workgroups together gave an opportunity for everyone to learn from one another, especially around areas such as decision making when it comes to youth.
“Community safety is a priority for Rotorua Police, and our teams are working tirelessly to ensure this happens. This is just one example of working together to hold offenders to account and prevent further harm.”
District Commander Tim Anderson spent Saturday night with the operation team and was extremely impressed with what he saw.
“They’re a formidable team, and I have no doubt their hard work paid dividends in stopping criminals in their tracks. It’s great to see our people out there doing such an incredible job for their community. If the public got to see what I did, they’d be just as blown away by our people’s professionalism and dedication.”
Image credit: Kindel Media
What a joke. Why has it taken this long for them to crack down? I will tell you why. Because Labour SPECIFICALLY told police they didn’t want to know about crime. That came from a Senior police officer in Rotorua.
They sent all the homeless and 501 s to Rotorua during covid and now we can’t get rid of them.
The place is ruined. Husband has 2 work colleagues who have had cars stolen in the last 2 months. We have beggars on intersections, beggars outside shops, beggars at the macdonalds drive thru and the CBD is full of low life’s who probably get more bene money than I earn.
Labour and our former ex labour mayor and her puppet CEO completely RUINED this once beautiful town. The council wastes money and some of the people in the council are personally associated with high ups in local iwi who directly benefit from this close relationship. So sick of the corruption, waste of our hard earned money on vanity projects and just so sick of the council having their fingers in every single pie,. None of them could run a proper business. They are a bunch of overpaid grifters.