Break and enters, thefts from vehicles.
Numbers from the most recent year-to-date statistics provided by the Police Services Board - which cover January through October, and compare stats from previous years - indicate that both types of crime increased in 2018.
There were a total of 707 break and enters last year, up 32.1 per cent from 535 break and enters in 2017.
Residences accounted for 35 per cent of those occurrences in 2018.
“We’ve been very public in the news in terms of the opioid crisis and where these folks...obviously get their funds to purchase more drugs,” Sault Ste. Marie Police Service Chief Hugh Stevenson said to board members during Thursday’s Police Services Board meeting.
“The ‘theft from motor vehicle’ is the one we should pay attention to,” Stevenson added, noting that number has increased from 338 reported thefts from vehicles in 2017 to 657 last year - a 94.4 per cent rise.
“...as your chief I can tell you - and from input from councillors - that’s probably the number one complaint in communities.”
In her first meeting as a member of the Police Services Board, Ward 2 councillor Lisa Vezeau-Allen agreed with Stevenson, saying that theft from vehicles is “...definitely something constituents are talking about, and quite often they’re not reporting, because nothing was taken, or there was no damage...it’s not always bad to call - not 911 - but call and just say that it happened.”
Stevenson told reporters during the board meeting that city police have noticed some trends.
“Councillors call me and say, ‘you know, we need to do something about this particular street,’ I hear it from members of the public, the fact that their vehicles are being broken into,” Stevenson said. “We’ve seen trends where the drug subculture will choose a particular street and go through the cars that they can find.”
“Obviously from a crime prevention perspective, we ask residents to make sure you take the time to lock your vehicle.”
Compounding the rising stats, Stevenson says, is a matter of catch and release.
“Anytime we find this particular issue, the majority of times these people are caught, and this is where I go back to the catch and release issue,” he told reporters. “If they were held in custody, that repeat victimization would not occur.”
“That’s why we as a community have to really take our release situations much more seriously. My job as your chief of police is to protect the public, and if people are utilizing the justice system as, ‘come in, get released, continue offences, the deterrent value has limited impact.”
Bail violations have also climbed in the city, from 313 in 2017 to 412 in 2018, which accounts for a 31.6 per cent increase.
“It’s simply the people that we’re arresting are usually out on release on at least two or three ‘recogs’ [recognizance of bail] or fail to appears, and so obviously when we deal with them in secondary and third offences,” Stevenson said, “We lay bail violation charges simply because the court has ordered them to keep the peace and be of good behaviour, and we find them in a criminal offence allegation, so we lay the charge.”
Between January and October of 2018, Sault Ste. Marie Police Service responded to a total of 28,239 calls for service - 14,248 of which were considered reportable calls.