Melton police hunt down anti-social gangs in the town

Patrols have been stepped up at locations in the town where it has been particularly bad, such as the streets outside McDonald’s, Morrisons,

The Royal British Legion and the Regal Cinema.

The local neighbourhood force has also been tackling recent bouts of vandalism in the town centre and say they have identified the culprits.

Melton Police said on their Facebook page that they acted swiftly on the graffiti drawn recently on St Mary’s Church, including Nazi swastikas, and

other buildings.

They posted: “Within four days, and thanks largely to the Grapes Public House CCTV, who were also targeted with graffiti damage, we were able to identify the culprits for the church, Grapes and town war memorial damage and these have been and are being dealt with robustly.”

The local policing team has also made a priority of dealing with burglars who have broken into a number of town businesses.

Officers posted: “With the recent increase in shop thefts a specific operation was set up focusing all our available resources during the hours of darkness, with both mobile and foot patrols, marked and unmarked cars and plain clothed officers.

“This was to act both as a deterrent and endeavour to catch the bad guys red handed.

“This proved highly successful and several individuals were arrested being caught both in the act and as a result of forensic evidence and CCTV.

“The latter was invaluable and as a result of teamwork between both police and local shops and business’s suspects were identified and are now behind bars.”