Burglaries down in Carlow/Kilkenny Garda Division but thefts from cars on the rise

The latest figures from for Carlow/Kilkenny show that Gardaí have been successful in reducing certain categories of crime, such as burglaries and thefts.

Speaking at the Joint Policing Committee (JPC) meeting on Friday, Chief Superintendent for the Division, Dominic Hayes, said crime statistics did not always give a clear picture of how safe people are, or how safe they feel.

One area the Gardaí have been targeting is burglaries, with notable results. There were 77 burglaries here in the first half of the year, compared to 2013, when there were 296 during the same period. 

Last year, for 26 weeks, there were two or fewer burglaries per week, and for seven weeks, only one burglary.

Chief Supt Hayes said people were taking heed of crime prevention advice, and communities were working with Gardaí to make them safer.

Text Alert schemes have nearly reached saturation point, covering almost the whole county. Gardaí continue to put in place checkpoints on certain days at key locations, including motorways and in rural areas.

Theft too, has fallen, with 347 incidents for the first half of this year, compared to 579 for the same period in 2015. Theft from shops is also down.

However, Chief Supt Hayes said that one area causing concern was theft from cars. Incidents are up almost 50% compared to this time last year.

Gardaí conduct searches of locations including car boot sales, but lack of clearly marked property hampers efforts. In a recent operation, 212 items were recovered but only four items were identified to be returned to their owners.

Chief Supt Hayes stressed the importance of properly marking devices/tools.