Evening Standard comment: Ignoring crime

As we report today, burglary is, together with theft, one of the offences which is least likely to be investigated by police. More than half of all crimes committed in London are not followed up.

Police say that screening out offences which are unlikely to be solved is an efficient use of police time, reserving energies for serious offences or those likely to be solved.

Perhaps so. But people feel aggrieved when they report a burglary and the police appear a day later, without gathering fingerprint or other evidence.

A rapid reaction to an offence raises the hope that the offender might actually be caught. And although Scotland Yard says that every reported offence is used for mapping crime, if there is little result from reporting a theft, victims will feel disinclined to report offences and crime will be under-estimated.

Where the public and police agree is that crime prevention is better than crime solving. A visible police presence is likely to be a deterrent to precisely those burglars and thieves who are hardest to catch after the event.

But solving crimes matters too. If police spent less time on paperwork and working to targets, they might actually catch some of the criminals who, at present, enjoy impunity.