Case Studies

Putting spoke in cycle theft

by Mark Rowe

An initiative aimed at reducing bicycle theft across County Durham and Darlington has been launched. As part of Operation Spoke, Durham Police will be working with local cycle retailers and the UK cycle database BikeRegister to introduce a bike marking scheme and to register bicycles in the area. BikeRegister (www.bikeregister.com) is owned and maintained by Selectamark.

The aim is that every new cycle sold will be marked and registered to their new owner at point of sale. People who already own bikes can also attend their local cycle retailers, police stations and other cycle marking events to have their bike (or bikes) marked and registered.

Operation Spoke is offering reduced price BikeRegister kits that include four permanent stencil etching marks, unique microdots, a QR code label and a tamper resistant BikeRegister warning label. This kit will make it virtually impossible to remove the identity of a bike, it’s claimed.

Crime Prevention Officer PC David Williamson said: “This really is a fantastic opportunity for anyone wishing to protect their bicycle, a simple yet highly effective method of preventing a bicycle from being taken and it takes only a few minutes.”

And Supt Kevin Weir, who is leading the initiative said: “The key benefit of the scheme is that should a bicycle be stolen it will be easy to identify by police. This means a stolen bicycle will be easy to return to a rightful owner. I am also hopeful that the introduction of this scheme will be a deterrent to bicycle thieves.

“The message I want to send out is simple – if you had a new bicycle for Christmas this year or are buying one in 2014, please register it with your retailer as part of Operation Spoke. Our aim is to get as many bikes as possible registered under the scheme, reducing the opportunity for bicycle theft across our force area.”

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