Crime in your hood: Where burglars and car thieves live and work in the south west

​BURGLARS in the southwest appear to like working close to home, with Cabramatta, Liverpool and Bankstown home to a high number of the crims. See how your suburb rates with our INTERACTIVE MAPS.

​BURGLARS in the southwest appear to like working close to home.

​Exclusive data released to Newslocal by the NSW Bureau of Crime statistics and Research (BOCSAR) reveals that Cabramatta, Liverpool and Bankstown are home to a high proportion of persons of interest (POIs) in relation to property crime. POIs may not have been convicted in court, however they have been proceeded against by the police.

From 2011 to March 2017​, a total of​​ 87 suspects were recorded living at Cabramatta with Bankstown and Liverpool home to another 79 each. Liverpool and Bankstown also recorded the highest number of burglaries, tallying 1156 and 887 respectively.

Bankstown also topped the list of car thefts with 991 over the same period, followed by Liverpool with 805.

But residents of Greendale ​and Horsley Park ​were in much more secure territory, recording fewer than 20 break-ins since 201.

A burglar breaking into house through an unlocked window.

Overall, however, Western Sydney is bearing the brunt of burglaries and car thefts with some suburbs despite break-ins dropping to their lowest level in 15 years. 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.

BREAK-INS 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

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

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

Professor Rick Sarre.

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

“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.

Bankstown topped the list of car thefts with 991.

Car thefts followed a similar pattern 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.

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.

CAR THEFT 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

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.

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.

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

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

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).

MALICIOUS DAMAGE 2011 TO MARCH 2017 MAP:

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

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).

Armed men attempt to hold up the McDonald’s restaurant at Prestons last month.

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.

“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.

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.