In the wake of a series of “truly horrible” recent agg burgs, Victoria Police has anounced it’s monitoring a list of 45 young chronic burglars and “influencers” said to be driving significant crime across Melbourne,
The 45 have connections with almost 2,000 known burglars and car thieves in Victoria, police say.
Twenty-five of them are in custody, while the remaining 20 are under close police watch.
Each of the people is under the age of 25, with 65 per cent under the age of 18.
Victoria Police Deputy Commissioner Bob Hill noted several “truly horrible incidents” involving homes invaded by armed intruders in recent days, including in Clyde.
“These incidents have rightly disturbed the Victorian community and despite 40-plus years in policing, it still shocks me that anyone thinks it’s acceptable to threaten another person with a knife in their own home or smash down their front door in the middle of the night.
“While our intel continues to show that almost 99 per cent of aggravated burglaries have no physical violence, one of these experiences is too many.
“Your home should be your castle and the sad reality for those impacted by these incidents is this will no longer feel like it’s the case.”
Southern Metropolitan Regional Crime Squad detectives are investigating two likely linked incidents in Brighton East and Clyde in the early hours of Monday 27 October.
At 1.30am on Monday 27 October, two masked males armed with a knife forced entry into a Brighton East home, before they were interrupted by a 76-year-old woman who was home.
Demands were made for her car keys, before another person home at the time intervened and the offenders fled in a white Toyota Prado.
Shortly afterwards at 2.50am in Clyde, there was another attempted home invasion where offenders attempted to break in, before being disturbed by occupants of the home and fleeing towards a vehicle.
The offenders, armed with knives, then chased occupants back into the property before fleeing in a white Toyota Prado.
In addition to these incidents, two police officers were also injured while responding to an aggravated burglary in Sandhurst early on Thursday 30 October.
Police say two males in an alleged stolen white Ford Ranger rammed the police vehicle, as the officers on patrol observed two alleged aggravated burglars running from a residence about 1am.
A senior constable from Southern Metro Region was taken to hospital with non-life-threatening-injuries and an acting sergeant from Southern Metro Region, suffered minor injuries.
The police car sustained significant damage to both the front and driver’s side.
No arrests have been made and investigations into the incident remain ongoing.
Victoria Police states it’s made almost 1700 arrests in the past year as part of its nightly Operation Trinity operation targeting burglars and car thieves across Melbourne’s east and south-east.
This month, Operation Trinity units have pulled over more than 3,500 cars, and recovered more than 100 stolen cars.
“From dusk to dawn every night, frontline police and specialist units such as the Public Order Response Team and Dog Squad are swarming Melbourne’s suburbs targeting home burglars and car thieves as part of Operation Trinity while the Air Wing watches from above,” Dep Comm Hill said.
“This has been the most well-resourced policing operation in Victoria over the past two and a half years – highlighting the severity of this offending.
“Outside of Operation Trinity, we are also proactively monitoring and targeting Victoria’s worst burglars.
“We know there are 45 chronic offenders or people who influence others to break into homes that are firmly in our sights.”
Any information on these incidents to Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000 or crimestoppersvic.com.au
