Late night Trespass and Anti Social Behaviour at Durham Railway Station.

Actions:

• The team continue to patrol Durham Station wherever possible.  Unfortunately just before Christmas there was a serious incident of trespass where a man ran in front of a train, narrowly missed being hit before being wedged between the train and platform.  He was uninjured which was remarkable considering the danger involved and was arrested and later received a caution.
• We patrolled the station over the weekend (Friday 13th, Saturday 14th and Sunday 15th).  It was really busy due to students returning back to university.  There were no instances of trespass due to officers being highly visible at the station.
• See our press release and interview: Trespass Incident at Durham
• More patrols over the weekend of 27th and 28th January.  The station was busy as always but due to our presence and staff being extra vigilant there were no issues.
• Dennis Middleton and Sergeant Reynolds have arranged to meet with Matt Deakin the Assistant Registrar at Durham University this Tuesday (30 Jan) with a view to having some input in the welcome pack provided to new students.  Instances of trespass aren't all about young people but we wanted to take the opportunity to get the message out to a wide audience. 

Begging at Doncaster Station.

Actions:

• This problem was identified at the September PACT meeting that begging was becoming a problem at the station.

• Station staff said they felt there had been an increase in beggars appearing at the station and one person in particular who is smartly dressed.

• Our officers reported a man for begging at the station on Friday (13th Jan) and we'll be taking positive action every day at the station until we've reduced the problem and deterred people from begging at the station.

• At our last PACT meeting (see PACT meeting minutes below 19 Jan) it was agreed that we should close this PSP due to the reduction in begging at Doncaster Station.  The PSP will be submitted to our monthly tasking group for consideration.

Anti Social Behaviour at the Excess Ticket Window and Gateline on Newcastle Railway Station.

Actions:

• At the August Police And Community Together (PACT) meeting the problem of anti-social behaviour in the travel centre and on the gateline was discussed.

• Officers have patrolled the area and a number of revenue operations have been conducted in partnership with Northern Rail.  Officers and Northern Rail staff worked together at the ticket barrier to deal with any ticket related offences such as fare evasion and fraudulent travel.

• It was agreed with East Coast staff that we should refer the closure of this PSP to the PACT Panel.  East Coast will endeavour to staff the excess fare window at busy times whenever possible and are considering positioning a ticket machine at the other side of the ticket barrier.

Actions:

• At the last PACT meeting on 19 January it was discussed at length that ASB is on the increase.  Representatives from the Frenchgate Centre, Bus Interchange and Rail Staff all said they'd seen an increase in young people hanging around the station and particularly the underpass leading from the bus interchange to Tesco.  Although this isn't our patch, it's fair to say the same people cause the same problems at the station so it makes sense to look at the bigger picture.
• We decided to look into applying for a dispersal order again.  When we got one in 2010 it was used appropriately and deemed a success when ASB decreased.  This time however, we can't justify taking the lead on applying for an order so we intend to discuss this with South Yorkshire Police with a view to their local Safer Neighbourhood Team making an application to cover the station and same geographical area as last time.  Map of previous dispersal order 
• We'll provide an update soon.

Other Priorities

Over the past weeks we've been working on other issues on our patch.  Cable theft remains high priority across the force and particularly in the north eastern area.  The whole team has been working along side our dedicated cable team to conduct high visibility patrols in the Blythe and Tyne area and also in distributing leaflets to the local community. 

We'd like anyone with any information about cable theft to contact us.  Cable theft can cause major disruption to the railway network not to mention being especially dangerous for anyone who chooses to steal cable.

We're also working hard to reduce the number of pedal cycles stolen at stations on our patch.  We've been concentrating on Doncaster and York as they are NPT stations but most other stations across the area are suffering from bikes being stolen in differing degrees.  We've had quite a bit of success and in December PCSO Jade Snaith was involved in the arrest of a person who was clearly out to steal a bike at Doncaster.

We'll continue to work on our own priorities as well as priorities specific to each station.