A watch scheme was launched to cover churches in Rutland a year ago and since then there hasn’t been a single incident of lead theft from a church. Leicestershire Police officers launched the scheme in November 2011 after neighbouring forces suffered a rise in lead thefts. Although Rutland had only had eight incidents in the previous two years, PC Paul Le Pla was worried that offenders might start to travel across the border and target churches in Rutland.
PC Le Pla decided to launch a scheme that encourages everyone who lives close to a church to look out for suspicious behaviour and report anything suspicious to the police. Officers also visited every church in the county to carry out a risk assessment and give crime prevention advice. They also added every church in Rutland to the community messaging system – Neighbourhood Link. As a result, they can quickly send up-to-date and localised crime prevention advice and timely warnings about suspicious activity in the area.
PC Paul Le Pla, said: “I am obviously delighted that we haven’t had any lead thefts from church roofs in Rutland for more than a year and I am convinced this is due in part to the vigilance of people living and working around our places of worship who are playing a more active role in protecting their community. I’d also like to thank Rutland officers for their hard work and commitment in pro actively patrolling around our churches, targeting offenders and increasing crime prevention awareness in the community.”
“We really want to maintain this success and would encourage everyone to continue to remain vigilant and report suspicious behaviour quickly in order to keep our places of worship safe.”
Canon Lee Francis-Dehqani from All Saints Church in Oakham, said; We are very pleased with the progress of this partnership between the churches and our local police. The community in Rutland have really rallied behind this initiative.”
Church Watch has also been rolled out in Melton Mowbray and Blaby. All the churches in Rutland are taking part in the Church Watch scheme but if any other local residents would like to sign up to Neighbourhood Link then they can do so www.neighbourhoodlink.co.uk.
