Tackling Shoplifting in the City Centre

Agreed on 1 February 2024. Updated on 25 June 2025

We understand the impact that shoplifting is having on businesses in the City Centre.

We are working with shops to help them report accurately and effectively, targeting our most prolific offenders.

We are conducting proactive patrols in hotspot areas, and around stores most effected by shoplifters.

We host a monthly Retailers Security Meeting alongside Bath BID. At this meeting we help stores identify regular shoplifters, and bring their attention to any new offenders and offending trends.

Actions

25 June 2025

In the past two weeks we have created a new ‘Neighbourhood Tasking Team’ embedded in the wider BANES Neighbourhood Policing Team. The role of this team is to specifically target the most harmful and impactful offenders in our area. Despite only being up and running for less than two weeks they have already had some great successes targeting prolific offenders that target shops and businesses around Bath:

Samantha Selway, a prolific shoplifter, was arrested last week and charged with four shop thefts and a theft of a motor vehicle in connection with incidents earlier this month. She appeared in court last week, plead guilty, and was bailed for sentencing next month. An application for a Criminal Behaviour Order has been made.

Caroline Beaverstock, another prolific shoplifter was arrested earlier this week and charged with 30 shop thefts that occurred between April and June this year, appearing in court this week and also pleading guilty. She was given a 12-month conditional discharge and a three-year Criminal Behaviour Order.

Lastly, Bobby Jenkins, a convicted burglar who often targets commercial premises, was arrested this week and charged with 2 burglaries and a theft of a pedal cycle. He was remanded in custody overnight and appeared at court yesterday, pleading guilty. He will reappear at court next month for sentencing.

Sergeant Tom Allwood-Coppin, supervisor for the new NTT says: “We know the significant harm these offences cause to our businesses and we are committed to tackling these issues as these cases show.

“Not only is there a financial impact on these businesses, but there’s also a wider impact on the whole community and we fully recognise that.

“We would always encourage any member of the public or business to report these incidents to us so we can take action.”

We’d like to extend our thanks to the businesses that took the time to report these incidents and support the subsequent investigation. These results would not have been achievable otherwise.
30 January 2025

Recent Positive Results:

Alongside Bath BID and our local business community, the City Centre Neighbourhood Team continue to pursue our most prolific shoplifters. We recently secured a conviction and 12 month prison sentence for shoplifting and other theft offences for one of the cities most well known offenders.

With assistance from our Antisocial Behaviour Team we’ve successfully issued a range of Community Protection Warnings, Community Protection Notices, and Acceptable Behaviour Contracts, with Criminal Behaviour Orders in progress for more harmful offenders.
24 October 2024

Positive results:

The combined Bath Neighbourhood Teams were recently successful in charging four prolific offenders with almost forty offences committed over the past few months, including several commercial burglaries and shop thefts. Two of the offenders have been remanded in custody awaiting sentencing, while a third has been recalled to prison.

We want to thank all the businesses affected for their continued support, without which we would not have been able to achieve these results.
28 August 2024

Over Summer City Centre Officers have continued to work alongside our ASB Team to address prolific shoplifters, and have since our last update we have:
- Issued another Community Protection Warning specifically relating to shop theft.
- Successfully prosecuted a chronic shoplifter for multiple offences, resulting in a sentence of over 20 weeks imprisonment.
- Kept up our monthly Retailers Security Meetings in partnership with Bath BID, enabling local businesses to point us towards offenders they are most concerned about.
- Launched a 3-month trial of a direct reporting system through the DISC security app, again in partnership with Bath BID. This should allow businesses to report incidents to us in a more streamlined fashion.
12 June 2024

In the last week the Bath City Centre Team have issued a prolific shoplifter with a Community Protection Warning with specific conditions around shop theft.

The support of the shops and businesses affected by offenders like these is crucial to our effort in tackling shoplifting. If you are being affected by frequent theft please get in touch with us.
24 April 2024

Since the launch of DISC we have seen many City Centre businesses take to the platform and begin sharing information with us and each other, targeting the shoplifters that are targeting them.

Bath BID have begun to issue Exclusion Notices to repeat offenders, and we continue to work with our ASB Team to issue Community Protection Warnings and Notices, and Criminal Behaviour Orders to the most prolific offenders.
1 March 2024

Update: Launch of DISC Security System in Bath

‘DISC’, a new security app has launched in Bath, linking together businesses, BID marshals and the Neighbourhood Policing Team enabling us to share information and intelligence, and allows instant alerts to be sent out to users.

Read More: www.bathbid.co.uk/bath-bid-launches-the-disc-system/