Arrests after police stop transit van in Worksop in crime crackdown

The operation targeting rural crime saw teams of officers spend Thursday, May 12 out on patrol in the district.

Officers spotted a transit van travelling on Potter Street, Worksop, thought to be involved in van thefts from across the county.

On closer inspection of the vehicle, officers found around 100 skeleton keys, an angle grinder and three cut-off catalytic converters.

MORE: Worksop neighbours call on council to take action against fly tipping

Two men aged 16 and 20, were arrested at the scene on suspicion of going equipped for theft of a motor vehicle. They remain in custody as enquiries continue.

Later, acting on intelligence gathered by teams in both Nottinghamshire and South Yorkshire, officers arrested two men in connection with the theft of two transit vans.

The night also saw three traffic offence reports being issued, including stopping a driver without a licence using a vehicle thought to be linked to crimes across the district.

Inspector Hayley Crawford, District Commander for Bassetlaw, said: “This operation is all about working with our partners in South Yorkshire and Derbyshire Police to tackle rural crime. We’re finding especially in Bassetlaw that because our community is quite rural that they’re being affected by these types of crime.

“We frequently get phone calls from members of the public telling us about what’s going on in their areas so we are using that information to work out where we need to deploy our efforts.

“Operations like this are great because it means we can go out in masse and start going for those criminals that are targeting people in the rural communities and start bringing them to justice.

“I understand the impact that rural crimes have on not just the people in our rural communities but also on their businesses and livelihoods.

“When we get reports of equipment being stolen, this is not only costly to the victims, but we often see during these offences that the suspects also cause damage to farmland, fencing and crops which can leave the victims even more out of pocket of thousands of pounds to repair the damage.”

The operation included teams of officers from the Bassetlaw neighbourhood policing team, the off-road bike team, Nottinghamshire Police’s knife crime team, road crime team and other units.