POLICE GET SMART WITH CRIMINALS

Safer Neighbourhoods teams have reported a significant drop in burglaries as a result of SmartWater, an invisible solution dabbed on valuables to identify them with a unique DNA code, writes Fiona Gray.

For the past six months police officers have distributed free packs of the product in five burglary hotspots across Hackney to help residents protect their homes against thieves. Police decided to expand the scheme after a successful trial in De Beauvoir last year.

The coating only shows up under ultra-violet light, and Safer Neighbourhoods police teams now carry special torches to check if iPods, jewellery or car radios have been marked with the substance. Even a tiny speck of the forensic coating can identify the real owner.

Residents in Newick Road and Roding Road in Lower Clapton, Bayston Road in Stoke Newington, Tudor Grove in South Hackney and Waterston Street in Haggerston have been given bottles of the anti-theft solution. It currently costs the police £40 to fit a home with SmartWater.

Eileen Jones, 62, lives in one of the chosen burglary hotspots. She said: “I feel much safer just with the SmartWater sticker in my window.

“My neighbour was robbed last year while she was in the house and I live alone, so I am glad the police have another way for me to protect my house and deter thieves.”

Sgt. Brian Gordon, head of Safer Neighbourhoods in Haggerston, said: “There was a growing concern about burglaries around Waterston Street, but in the last six months we have had practically no thefts in the area. Once we get statistics on how successful the scheme has been, I hope [the police] will be able to finance it for the whole of Hackney.”

He said he was pleased the scheme had expanded to include streets on his patch, but stressed there was more work to do.

“This is a successful initiative and needs to be put all over the place, but the problem is who is going to finance it," he said.

"Each SmartWater pack costs the police £40 a year per household. Our priority is residential areas but small businesses, especially around City Road and Old Street, need protection too.”

SmartWater provides a special pack for businesses, containing a sprinkler system that is triggered when intruders try to get into a property or a sensitive area of a business, such as a cash room. It sprays the intruder with the invisible forensic coating, which stays on skin and hair for up to four weeks and on clothes indefinitely.

Suspected burglars brought in to Hackney police station are then scanned with an ultra-violet light to check for the incriminating stains linking them with the crime scene, and can now be caught long after committing a crime.

But the SmartWater scheme is just one part of larger a campaign launched by Hackney’s Safer Neighbourhoods teams to help people take simple steps to protect their properties.

After a survey of security issues in the Shoreditch area, police are encouraging residents to keep bushes cut back to reduce the number of hiding places, make sure windows and doors look secure, as well as displaying SmartWater and Neighbourhood Watch stickers in their windows.

Sgt. Gordon said: “There are lots of cheap, easy ways to keep your house safe and we visit every house that is burgled to educate people about them.”