The Six Villages

Violence Against Women and Girls

Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) refers to a wide range of crimes and abusive behaviours that disproportionately affect women and girls, although people of all genders can be victims. These offences cause significant physical, emotional, psychological, and social harm, and their impact often extends beyond individuals to families and communities. There have been an increase in exposure offences reported in the borough of Surrey Heath.
Surrey Police is committed to pursuing those who are committing these types of offences. We are aware that VAWG offences are underreported and our team are engaging with the community to encourage reporting and using 999 when there is a crime in progress. Increased patrols are being completed in places that have been targeted for these types of offences. The neighbourhood team are working with our proactive team to arrange days of action with specially trained officers to observe and intervene when necessary.
Since the priority has been added the following work has been undertaken by the local team:
•Day of action with plain clothes and specially trained officers observing behaviours in large green spaces across the borough.
•Joint work with the council during World Cup games offering a safe space for victims of VAWG offences, along with uniformed patrols and the use of specially trained officers.
•Local officers have attended park run events to engage with participants and raise awareness
•Plans are being made for the summer period for events to engage with the public around this subject and further patrols in hotspot locations being planned.

Anti-Social Behaviour (ASB) and Drug activity in West End

We are receiving increasing reports of general anti-social behaviour in the West End area, specifically including the use of illicit substances.

In response to this, we will be working hard to engage with the community to highlight offenders, thus allowing us to take targeted positive action towards those responsible for the use/supply of drugs into our communities. We will be increasing our patrols of identified areas where such activity is either taking place or originating from, both in uniform and plain clothes

Retail and Rural Thefts

Retail and business crime is not only a Local, but National priority under Operation Assure. In the villages we will be specifically targeting shoplifting payment offences in village shops and make off without payment offences in our many fuel garages, with high visibility vehicle and foot patrols, meaningful engagements with local business owners and a robust approach towards offenders.

Extensive work is already underway with businesses such as BP Lightwater including working with our “designing out crime officer” (DOCO) to provide extensive crime prevention tactics and advice. We will also be looking to visit the rural locations and engage with the community, offering crime prevention and reporting advice as well as trying to identify more specific issues the community are facing.

West End Recreation Ground and Lightwater Country Park -ASB within the recreation ground and country park including the illegal use of E-Scooters and bikes

High visibility patrols will continue to be made of the park and access routes by the local police team. Action will be taken against individuals who use E-scooters, motorbikes and illegal E-bikes. Officers will work to identify offenders and use a range of police powers including Section 59 warnings, Section 165 Road Traffic Act (Seizure of vehicle) and traffic offence reports.

Operation Pepper - focusing on the use of cash-based businesses such as barber shops, nail salons, vape shops and car washes that are often used by organised crime groups to launder their money and as a hub for their criminality

We have conducted various visits with partner agencies on subject businesses and will continue to do so over the coming months. We will be seeking and executing warrants on relevant properties linked to criminal activity and robustly targeting offenders of crime within these businesses.