What are police doing to stop phone snatchers? Metro went on patrol to find out

‘Excuse me, please can you help me? My phone was just snatched off me, how do I get it back?’

A woman walked up to a group of four police officers on patrol on Oxford Street, making her the third person who has had her phone snatched in central London that day.

It is a similar tune across the capital – if you haven’t had your phone snatched, you know someone who has.

‘The worst I have had is about 40 phones being snatched across four hours,’ PC Tibor Kovacs said.

Only a handful were recovered only after he injured his arm trying to grab a thief zooming past him.

But in a race between the two legs of an officer and an e-bike which has been tampered to reach 70mph, it is a no-brainer who is going to win.

More than 50,000 phones were snatched last year in London. Reports show them turning up all over the UK, with many now appearing in China.

Turning to the woman, all the officers could do was encourage her to make a report online and cancel all of her online banking.

Not entirely satisfied, the woman said: ‘It happened right at the restaurant I work at, there are cameras everywhere, can I submit that?’

The officers replied ‘of course’, but will she, or anyone else, ever get their phone back? Here’s what happened when Metro was invited to join the newly created Town Centre Team.

How are phones being stolen so easily?

The number of phones being stolen is only going up in the capital with a 73% increase from 2019, the Mayor of London’s Office said.

Reports increase over the summer as the city is flooded with tourists holding their phones out staring at google maps and looking up reviews for the best places to eat.

Chief Inspector Al Connelly told Metro: ‘Phone snatchers grab as many devices as they can while going ridiculous speeds on illegal e-bikes.’

He said the Met believes the snatchers are a mixture of individual opportunists, smaller gangs and larger criminal organisations.

But identifying them beyond that is hard work considering they are covered head to toe in an attempt to disguise themselves, giving would-be criminals a sense of invisibility.

What can the police do to get the phones back?

There are a few tools police are able to use to try and catch phone snatchers – aside from trying to chase them down on foot.

Helicopters have started to be deployed to try and locate the snatcher as they speed through central London.

‘If we get it up quickly we can cover the city and track them with relative ease,’ Al said.

But it is not not often they are given the go-ahead to send one up, as helicopters are reserved for more pressing emergencies, leaving officers on the ground to fend for themselves.

Chasing them down is a risky business, as the risk of knocking over pedestrians is high as the snatchers is able to wind through pavements and alleys with ease.

Tibor said he injured his upper arm trying to stop one, and had to take time off work to recover.

What if victims can track their phones themselves?

Victims have said repeatedly how frustrating it is watching their phone travel across London, while police say there is nothing they can do to retrieve it.

Many victims are able to trace the phone themselves using features such as Find My iPhone.

Rutesh Durve, 37, told Metro: ‘After my phone was stolen out of my hands, my wife was sat at home tracking it while I was wondering Regents Street not knowing what to do.

‘She could see it was around the SE14 area for a few hours before it pinged in the Tottenham and stayed there for a few days before it turned up in China.

‘But the police closed the vase while the phone was still pinging in London – it was so frustrating.’

Officers explained they can’t just go to a property demanding to search it for stolen phones.

PS Simon Gratton said: ‘A Find My iPhone location is not deemed to be enough evidence for a court to give us a warrant to search a property.

‘They are only accurate to 3 metres, and these snatchers aren’t stupid, they know to put phones on airplane mode so it only shows the last known location, not the current one.

Also if the location shows up in a block of flats, you can’t search every single property in the building just to find one phone.’

But patterns are starting to form, and investigators hope they will soon have enough evidence.

Chief Inspector Connelly said: ‘We are building up an intelligence picture which can be presented to the courts.

‘We still want victims to keep giving us their phones location on tracking apps so help us even more.’

What happens after they are taken?

But with many phones not returned, it is still not entirely clear what exactly happens to them, and why many are ending up in China.

Victims report being sent messages through their iCloud account letting them know their phone ‘has been found’ and to ‘send their passcode’.

If they don’t after a few days, the messages can turn combative.

Mr Durve said: ‘After a few days my wife started to get a few messages claiming to be from Find My iPhone, saying my device has been found and to send the passcode.

‘It looked like a sophisticated level of criminality, as they sent a link yo a web page which said would show my location.

‘We saw through it by then messages were coming through with the criminals threatening to sell my phone if I didn’t unmark it as lost or stolen.’

‘We know it is a very personal type of theft, as we hold our lives in our phones with pictures and messages,’ Al said.

‘We are doing our best to try and find them. We are well aware there is a big second hand market for them in China, and it is down to other teams to try and intercept them being taken out of the country.’

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