Statistics released last week by North Yorkshire Police have revealed a six per cent rise in recorded crimes in York so far this year, much of which has seen students as prime targets.
According to the North Yorkshire Police crime-mapping website, York city centre is in the top two per cent of areas with the highest crime rate in England and Wales, with a staggering 3,925 crimes reported within the city walls in the first four months of 2011.
Many of the incidents that form the statistics occur in or around York’s nightclubs. Young women were identified as being especially at risk to a type of opportunist theft known as “handbag dipping”. The police said: “women can tend to leave their bags or mobile phones while they visit the lavatory or bar and are easy pickings for thieves.” A recent spate of these thefts has become such an issue that police patrolled York pubs and clubs last weekend to hand out crime prevention information.
Violence is a recurring issue for students on nights out, but alcohol-fuelled brawls have recently got more out of hand.
In the early hours of Saturday morning, a man in his twenties was put in hospital after having his head “stamped on” in a serious assault outside Mansion. The two suspects ran away before police arrived and so far nobody has been arrested, a North Yorkshire Police spokesperson told Vision.
An investigation remains ongoing for an assault in February outside Gallery when a 20-year-old man sustained a broken jaw in a “vicious and unprovoked attack.” The police released CCTV shots last week in an attempt to catch the assailant. The Luminar Group, which owns Gallery, was unavailable for comment about the assault.
Mark Botham, Chair of the North Yorkshire Police Federation, has been quick to pin the blame on funding cuts, with the force being made to save £8.9 million this year. He described the cuts as “ill-planned and drastic,” and warned that they “will undoubtedly lead to increased levels of crime and a poorer service for the public in North Yorkshire.”
Nevertheless, most students are still relatively confident of the safety of their York surroundings. One first-year Law student commented that, although the recent data was alarming, “I don’t feel particularly vulnerable… the only times I do is on Saturday nights, so I avoid going into York then.”