Burglary victim: Why bother?

Barry Porter. Photo / Supplied

A victim of several burglaries says he now pauses before asking the police to investigate because it takes them too long to respond.

Several burglary victims have contacted the Herald after former senior sergeant Des Hall said response times had become sluggish.

Among those is Barry Porter, who after many break-ins - including six in two months - at the two West Auckland dental clinics he manages, wonders if it is worthwhile calling police.

"If I get broken into and what's taken is of low value I'm thinking, 'Should I even call the police?'

"What's the point of going through all of that and getting a police reference number? You know nothing is going to happen for a couple of days, so why bother?"

He said his insurance company had settled "a couple of $10,000 claims" and "another for $6000" for his stolen property.

But the police response to his complaints had been "terrible".

After one burglary, part of his office had to be boarded up and a window was left broken for five days until police could start their investigation.

But they arrived 30 minutes after a break-in was reported at his practice in West Harbour, above a GP's office.

"Drugs must be one of the key things that gets them out there immediately, so they can do the fingerprinting on the drug cabinets and see what is going to hit the streets around the area. I really think the police need more staff. There's just not enough people to investigate these petty thefts or burglaries."

Waitakere area commander Inspector Gary Davey admitted police in the area had difficulty meeting their 24-hour response time target last year but things had improved.

Mr Davey said staff in the area normally responded to about 40 dwelling burglaries a week but last week that total was 67.

"So trying to get to all of those when we are having a bad week is a little more difficult but we do our absolute best to get there within 24 hours."

He didn't agree that people weren't contacting police because of an apparent delay in responding to complaints.

His experience was that burglary was normally always reported - particularly if people wanted their insurance claims verified.

Statistics from the police website show reported burglary rates in Waitakere have remained relatively static, with 289 reported in July last year compared with 291 last month.