Crime down in Doncaster as police response times improve

BURGLARIES and violent crime have been reduced across Doncaster, while police are now responding to emergency incidents more quickly.

The area’s police commander, Chief Supt Pete Thorp took responsibility for the area earlier this year and said he was now expecting further progress in 2025.

"It's been an incredibly encouraging year for policing in Doncaster and it has been my privilege to take over as District Commander and oversee the brilliant officers and staff and the hard work they do all year round.

”Policing comes in many forms and a lot of the work that drives some of our best results often goes on behind the scenes. It is important we acknowledge the efforts of everyone here at the district as they all play a part in reducing crime in Doncaster.

"I am pleased to say that over the course of 2024, we have been able to significantly improve our emergency and priority response times.

"One key area of improvement we have seen in Doncaster in 2024 is a reduction in reports of most serious violence (MSV), which includes offences such as serious assaults, knife crime and violence against women and girls.

"We know MSV was regularly and rightly raised as a concern by people across the borough, particularly incidents of this nature in the city centre.

"We've devised specific patrol plans for key hotspot areas where MSV has previously been more prevalent and having a visible presence of officers has helped to discourage this type of criminality which has no place on the streets of Doncaster.

"We've also seen a reduction in residential burglaries, which is testament to the ongoing work of Operation Castle and problem-solving approaches to tackling burglaries in defined geographical areas of Doncaster with a noticeably higher number of reports.

"Designated patrols and intelligence work has been carried out in these areas and has resulted in another yearly drop in the number of overall offences in Doncaster when you compare 2023 to 2024.

"We know how devastating neighbourhood crime can be and we are continuing to gather more intelligence and evidence on patterns of offending, including key locations, times and dates, and we will factor this into our future policing response,” he said.