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New retail crime app helps track down shoplifters

Tony FisherBedfordshire, Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire
News imageOffice of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Hertfordshire A man wearing glasses in a grey suit with a blue tie standing outside the blue branding of a Boots store, talking to a female PCSO who is in uniform - wearing a yellow high-vis vest.Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Hertfordshire
The police and crime commissioner for Hertfordshire, Jonathan Ash-Edwards, said retailers wanted easier ways to report offences and more action against repeat offenders

A system that helps retailers report offences such as shoplifting has been hailed a success by police.

The Auror platform was rolled out in April in Hertfordshire, allowing large retailers to report crimes via an online app directly to police and upload images such as CCTV footage.

Supt Jamie Fowler, who leads on retail crime in the county, said it had helped bring "more offenders to justice".

He said in one instance the platform helped identify 27 linked offences and that there had been a 50% increase in reports of retail crime in September so far, compared with the same month last year.

Fowler said his team had noticed a similar increase in the number of suspects identified.

News imageHertfordshire Police Mug shots of two men pictured side by side. The man on the left is wearing a brown top and has short black hair and a short beard. The man on the right has a blue top with a zip. He has dark brown hair with a short slightly greying beard.Hertfordshire Police
Claudiu Melencu (left) and Raduco Ene (right) were both jailed for over two years having pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit theft

Auror is used elsewhere in the UK by Devon and Cornwall Police and the Metropolitan Police.

The software was successfully used in Stevenage when two men were arrested at the Roaring Meg Retail Park by the neighbourhood policing team.

Speaking in April, Fowler said stock worth about £190,000 had been stolen during 43 thefts reported between 16 January and 2 April.

They were charged with conspiracy to commit theft in connection with more than 40 shoplifting offences from multiple Boots stores across England and Wales, including Stevenage and London Colney near St Albans.

Claudiu Melencu, 36, of Gainsborough Avenue in Newham, east London, and Raduco Ene, 42, of Newmarket Green, south-east London, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit theft at St Albans Crown Court on 28 July.

Melencu was sentenced to 27 months in prison and Ene was sentenced to 24 months in jail.

Fowler said the platform was also valuable in helping combat organised crime groups that repeatedly targeted retailers.

News imageOffice of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Hertfordshire A PCSO in uniform, including a yellow high-visibility vest, talking to a man wearing a dark top and grey trousers in a Boots store. They are walking towards the camera. Both of them have their hands together in front of them. The man is wearing a jacket with a Boots logo on it.Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner for Hertfordshire
PCSO Zoe Davison recently spoke with Boots store manager Dan Backhouse, who says that the Auror platform has proved effective

Jonathan Ash-Edwards, the police and crime commissioner for Hertfordshire, told the BBC he had made "funding available" to smaller and independent businesses to use a "similar innovative system".

ShopSafe Alert is being rolled out in Harpenden and Waltham Cross following initial pilots in St Albans, Bishop's Stortford and Welwyn Garden City.

The ambition is to expand the app across Hertfordshire into a single coordinated system.

If so, then it is expected the county will be among the first areas in England to adopt this approach.

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