Crime in your ‘hood: Where Sydney’s burglars and car thieves live and work

WESTERN Sydney is bearing the brunt of Sydney’s burglaries and car thefts with some suburbs hit over a thousand times since 2011. See how your suburb rates with our INTERACTIVE MAPS.

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WESTERN Sydney is bearing the brunt of burglaries and car thefts with some suburbs hit over a thousand times since 2011, and that’s despite break-ins dropping to their lowest level in 15 years.

Exclusive data released to Newslocal by the NSW Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research (BOCSAR) shows the top ten suburbs for home break-ins are all in the west or south west, with the worst nine suburbs for car theft also in this region.

From 2011 to March 2017 there were more than a thousand break-ins to homes in each of Blacktown, Liverpool, Parramatta and Strathfield but none of these places ranked in the top 20 home suburbs for offenders or suspects.

Rick Holder at his home in Blacktown where his father James Patrick Holder’s WWII Royal Navy medals were stolen during a break-in.

Affluent suburbs in Sydney’s east or north shore had much lower burglary rates: in the same period Middle Cove in the north and Watsons Bay in the east each recorded fewer than 20 break-ins.

SOUTH-WEST SYDNEY: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

PENRITH AND BLACKTOWN: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

PARRAMATTA AND NORTH WEST: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

Former Australian and New Zealand Society of Criminology president Professor Rick Sarre of the University of SA said the decline in property crime is not spread equally.

Professor Rick Sarre.

“We know criminals target homes that don’t have security alarms but that means the rich can get protection and the poor don’t,” Prof Sarre said.

The BOCSAR data also reveals suburbs where alleged offenders or persons of interest (POIs) reside. POIs may not have been convicted in court, however they have been proceeded against by the police.

The suburbs break and enter POIs called home most often were: Waterloo, Redfern, Macquarie Fields, Airds and Bidwill, with Glebe topping the list for POIs in 2016 with 38 offenders.

In some areas reports of home break-ins smash past a hundred while zero locals are implicated.

On the north shore, the suburbs of Killara and East Killara reported 383 break-ins with zero POIs between 2011 and March 2017, also in the north Wollstonecraft (186) and West Pymble (138) got hit hard.

Police lead a juvenile offender into court after three-week crime spree, including a robbery at Killara Motor Inn and a home invasion in Lindfield.

BREAK AND ENTER 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

Car thefts follow a similar pattern to break-ins where some western Sydney suburbs saw hundreds of cars nicked, many of them Holden Commodores. Stealing from cars was also a western Sydney specialty with some places suffering more than a thousand thefts in the six years to March 2017.

EASTERN SUBURBS: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

INNER WEST: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

CENTRAL COAST: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

The top suburbs cars were pinched from were Bankstown, Blacktown, Liverpool, Penrith, Auburn and Greenacre. The top suburbs for car thief POIs were Marrickville, Blacktown, Glebe, Guildford, and Whalan.

Half of all cars are stolen from a home, and Holden Commodores made up five of the top 10 most stolen car models according to the national motor vehicle theft reduction council.

Three quarters of car thefts are short term and used for transport, joy-riding or committing other crimes, the council reported.

Police pursued this stolen car on the Hume Hwy at Canley Vale and arrested the driver. Pic: Damian Hofman

Prof Sarre said car thefts were down about 75 per cent over the past 20 years as the only way to steal a car these days was to break into a home to the steal keys.

“While immobilisers are typically built into cars after 2001, they offer no protection if a thief has access to your keys,” Prof Sarre said.

CAR THEFT 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

The most common crimes reported to NSW Police between 2011 and March 2017 were malicious damage (vandalism), stealing from cars and fraud.

The top Sydney suburbs where thieves broke into cars were: Blacktown (2575 reports), Liverpool (2395), Surry Hills (1975), Bankstown (1792), Campbelltown (1526) and Mount Druitt (1495).

In the same period the top Sydney suburbs where POIs that steal from cars lived were: Waterloo, Redfern, Marrickville, Surry Hills and West Pymble.

CCTV footage from a Hyde Park home captures the moment a thief tries to steal a car.

Shoplifting reports between 2011 and March 2017 centred around large shopping complexes in Sydney, Parramatta, Blacktown, Liverpool, Bondi Junction.

The most POIs for this crime were living in Surry Hills (710), Blacktown (637), Redfern (598), Macquarie Fields (524), and Waterloo (524).

THE HILLS AND HORNSBY: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

MACATHUR REGION: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

NORTH SHORE: SEE THEIR CRIME STATS

Criminologist and Senior Lecturer at Sydney University Dr Garner Clancey said criminals “generally” stay close to home and hit targets they know when doing their worst.

CCTV image shows a man stealing from a chemist in Zetland.

“The journey to crime data suggests offenders travel quite short distances, only a couple of kilometres and tend to offend in areas they know ... because they have an understanding of likely chances to be caught,” Dr Clancey said.

MALICIOUS DAMAGE 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

The top Sydney suburbs for vandalism reports were: Blacktown, Sydney, Penrith, Parramatta and Campbelltown, while the top suburbs that vandal POIs called home were: Blacktown, Surry Hills, Doonside, Macquarie Fields and Liverpool.

The BOCSAR data attributes some POIs to suburbs if they were living in local jails, so the numbers for areas such as Silverwater and Goulburn are inflated and excluded from the above analysis.