Do business owners have appropriate security measures in place? So the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) asks after a number of kidnap-robberies.
Managers and staff who notice anything suspicious at premises or their homes should bear in mind the risk of kidnap in the middle of the night. On December 29 a woman was put into the boot of a car while her captives demanded money from a business in east Belfast. No money was taken. On December 28 a man was forced to take money from business premises in Belfast city centre while armed men held his wife and three children captive. On December 18 a woman and her two young children were held captive while her husband was forced to get money from a retail business in the Sprucefield area. Det Supt Peter Farrar of the PSNI Serious Crime Branch says businesses of all sizes could be targeted.
"It is important to emphasise that these so-called ‘tiger kidnaps’ are becoming less and less frequent. However they are very serious and very violent crimes, and business owners, whether they run a large retail unit or just a corner shop, must ensure that they have good security surrounding their premises and indeed their homes. The hostages, usually relatives of a key holder or manager, are kept under very frightening conditions, and the victim is under huge duress as their family members are often threatened with violence. Businesses owners need to ask themselves ‘What preventative measures do I have in place to stop this from happening?’"
According to PSNI the region since 2004 has seen 55 kidnap and robberies or attempted kidnap and robberies. Some 35 people have been charged. Ten people have been convicted. Arguably the most high profile (£26m) robbery was from Northern Bank in Belfast in December 2004. And while Northern Ireland is going through the peace process still, last year saw cases of what police call ‘viable devices’.
As NI becomes ‘normalised’ after the Troubles, ironically that means the region falls more in line with the rest of the UK’s ‘normal’ crime. In December was published the latest Northern Ireland Crime Survey’ (NICS). It found almost two-thirds (65 per cent) of those asked believed that crime across Northern Ireland had increased in the previous two years – putting the region’s fear of crime now on a par with England and Wales as recorded in the 2007-8 British Crime Survey. The government in Sotrmont however points to falls in recorded crime.
The latest, 20th report in November of the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC, www.independentmonitoringcommission.org) found paramilitaries in NI a ‘serious and continuing’ threat. Criminals under the republican banner, or for example the Continuity Irish Republican Army (CIRA), besides tiger kidnaps, do drug dealing, robberies and extortions, fuel laundering and smuggling, especially of tobacco. Dissidents are trying to kill PSNI officers; or, by engineering public disorder, or setting fire to hijacked vehicles, then looking to hurt the police officers at the scene. Loyalist paramilitaries, too, do violent and other serious crime; and sell counterfeit goods. According to the IMC, people are generally confident that there will not be a return to the former troubles; but when in Belfast last year Professional Security found fear that an economic depression that led to more youths unemployed could allow paramilitaries to recruit.
A next, political step for ‘normalisation’ of NI is the devolution of justice and policing. As the IMC says, law enforcement is a matter for all bodies. For instance, if criminals are in debt to utilities, or doing benefit frauds, are they rigorously pursued? While the IMC does not mention the upcoming SIA-badging of door staff and contract security officers, this is the charged politicial background the London-based regulator has to enter.
