75% increase in burglaries

Saturday 27th September 2008, 10:00AM BST.

POLICE are urging Islanders to lock doors and windows after the number of house burglaries soared by 75% this summer.

A total of 150 homes have been burgled since May compared to just 86 during the same period last year. In June 49 break-ins were recorded – the highest monthly figure for at least two years and well over the three-year average of 22 burglaries for that month.

Today police are urging Islanders to step up home security, revealing that threequarters of all the burglaries occurred because doors or windows had been left unlocked.

Acting Chief Inspector Chris Beechey said: ‘There has been a sharp increase in the number of house burglaries this summer, but it is important to stress that the offenders actually broke into the house in only a quarter of the incidents. In the rest of the burglaries they simply got in through an open window or door.

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