Crime

The re-elected Surrey County councillor for Ashford has created a neighbourhood watch for her area.

Cllr Carol Coleman, of Nelson Road, decided to set it up after a burglary happened in the road in May, and is in the final process of sorting out the paperwork.

The aims are to keep the residents vigilant and make them feel safer by notifying Surrey Police when they see suspicious behaviour.

Four people were arrested during a police scheme to crack down on motoring crime and anti-social driving.

Operation Quake took place on Monday 18 and Tuesday 19 May in Ashford and Stanwell and stopped 108 vehicles, with two arrested for disqualified driving and two arrested for theft of cars.

Fixed penalty notices were issued to 25 drivers and 12 vehicles were seized.

Spelthorne neighbourhood inspector Sarah Greenhalgh said: "I hope these positive results demonstrate how seriously North Surrey Police is taking the issue of anti-social driving. "

Police launched a two-day initiative to cut back on anti-social driving on Monday 19 May and Tuesday 19 May.

The idea was to cut back on dangerous driving in Ashford and Stanwell, which saw police officers from Spelthorne check random vehicles to cut down on cold callers and rogue traders.

Burglars have broken into two Ashford homes and tried to raid several more by reaching through the letterbox to open the front door.

And residents are being warned to lock themselves in at night after intruders got into the homes in Avondale Road and Gordon Road that had not been deadlocked on Friday January 23.

Mindless thugs smashed a concrete slab through the front of a charity shop.

They targeted the glass front door of the RSPCA shop in Church Road, Ashford, on Thursday January 8, but didn't steal anything.

Distraught shop manager Ken Stevens, and chairman of the charity's Hillingdon, Slough, Windsor and Kingston branch, Irene Hansford, says it's the latest in a string of bad luck stories to have hit it in the past month.

Street-savvy youths from Spelthorne signed a petition pledging not to carry knives and presented it to Spelthorne MP, David Wilshire, at the House of Commons last week.

More than 5,000 young people signed the petition, 'Knives Wreck Lives' - organised by the Spelthorne Youth Council - which launched on October 27 and presented their pledges to their local MP on Tuesday, December 9.

Arsonists torched a car in Maxwell Road, Ashford, on Friday December 12.

Sunbury firefighters spent nearly an hour dousing the blazing blue Fiat Punto after being called by neighbours at about 2.15am.

A series of homes in Ashford have been burgled in broad daylight in recent weeks as police fear criminals are looking to fill their pockets for Christmas.

The culprits have been targeting the area but Spelthorne as a whole saw an 82% increase in break-ins in October compared with the same period last year.

Thugs walked down two Ashford roads on Monday evening smashing up cars with For Sale posts they had taken from front gardens.

Police are appealing for witnesses after the criminal damage attacks in Marlborough Road and Chesterfield Road at about 11pm.

A prolific criminal who was on the run for nearly a month after he breached the conditions of his release licence has handed himself in to police.

Thomas Barlow, 26, of Beards Road, Ashford, gave himself up at Staines Police Station on Tuesday October 28 when he failed to obey a recall to Wandsworth Prison at the beginning of October after a parole stint since March.

Barlow, who is now back at Wandsworth Prison, was convicted of offences including burglary, aggravated vehicle taking, criminal damage, driving while disqualified and two counts of obstructing a police officer in 2005 and sentenced to four years in prison.