Crime down in Athlone over past three years

Crime in Athlone has consistently dropped over the last three years according to Superintendent Aidan Glacken. During the inaugural meeting of the Athlone Town Joint Policing Committee last Friday, Supt Glacken told town councillors, Oireachtas members and community representatives, that crime had dropped as Gardaí increased their focus on community policing and crime prevention. However drug crimes continued to be the main problem in the town. 'Overall from a policing point of view, I"m here four years and crime is on the decline and has been for the last three years,' said Supt Glacken. 'Recorded crime was down 13% last year, 9% the year before and down 6% the year before that.' He said the number of serious assaults decreased by 50% while ordinary and common assaults were down 30% last year. He said the detection rates for all crime now stood at 50%. 'We"ve invested very substantially in community policing over the last number of years, we"ve gone from three to nine full-time officers,' he added. 'This is very, very beneficial and we"ve received very good feedback. It"s about crime prevention.' He said that this type of policing was all about the 'softly, softly approach' and was very effective. 'Our main concern at the moment is drugs, it"s a critical issue for us, especially the use and abuse of heroin and its impact on crime,' he said. He said that from time to time there were certain 'isolated' public disorder issues which were largely caused by small pockets of groups involved in drugs or feuding families. There were 300 burglaries last year in the Athlone area and in one third of these charges were brought. He said that the town didn"t have a problem with public order offences, which in part was due to the increase in foot patrols on weekend nights. Cllr John Butler praised the level of street policing and said that the results were very evident. There are currently 70 full-time gardaí stationed in Athlone and a further 21 in Moate, Kilbeggan Glasson and Ballymore. There are four working full-time in the drugs unit, and two sergeants and 16 gardaí each working in community policing and public order. There is one garda working full-time in administration while the remaining work on patrol, investigations, traffic, crime prevention and detection. Supt Glacken said Gardai review their goals every quarter, but that local crime issues, traffic and public order were reviewed as often as is necessary. Cllr Mark Cooney asked if Supt Glacken felt there was a need for more manpower in the town. Supt Glacken said there were probably 20 more staff now than in Athlone four years ago. 'We"re sometimes hit by other factors, but at the moment we have sufficient resources,' he said. Cllr Kieran Molloy asked was it enough that only four staff were assigned to the drugs unit. Supt Glacken said that while there were four gardaí working full-time in the drugs unit, it did not include the number of staff involved in intelligence, searches and operations. He said the team meet every morning to review what"s happening locally and that more staff would be assigned to work with the drugs unit if for example, drugs had been seized. 'Drugs are interwoven with crime. There are nine personnel full-time in crime and also community gardaí are active in that field as well,' he said. Deputy Mary O"Rourke said she was 'amazed' by the statistics read out by Glacken showing the drop in crime. 'The detection rates are very significant,' she said.