FOI 357-2025 / Mar 2025 / Theft
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 357-2025
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 24th March 2025 as follows:
Q1. For each of the following calendar years, please provide the number of cars reported as stolen to the force.
- 2020
- 2021
- 2022
- 2023
- 2024
Q2. For each of the following calendar years, please provide the number of cars recovered after being reported stolen.
- 2020
- 2021
- 2022
- 2023
- 2024
Q.3. In each of the following calendar years, please state how many reports of a car being stolen led to a charge or summons.
- 2020
- 2021
- 2022
- 2023
- 2024
Clarification
On 25th March 2025 the following request for clarification was sent to you:
Where you have stated, "the number of cars reported as stolen," please clarify that you are asking about vehicles in general and that you are asking for figures based on the Home Office Crime Code 48/01 - Theft of a motor vehicle?
On 15th April 2025 you advised:
Please could you include both theft of a motor vehicle and aggravated theft of a motor vehicle?
Ideally, I would only like data relating to cars, but if that's not possible, please provide data relating to all motor vehicles.
Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
When reviewing the information please note that it was obtained by conducting a search of the Crime Recording System for all offences, recorded between 1st January 2020 and 31st December 2024, with the below primary Home Office Offence Classification Codes:
- 37/2 – Aggravated Vehicle Taking (excluding attempt offences)
- 48 – Theft or Unauthorised Taking of a Motor Vehicle (excluding attempt offences)
It has not been possible to filter out those that are not cars and therefore the below represents all vehicles.
Please note that the numerical data presented in this response is an unaudited snapshot of unpublished data sourced from "live" systems and is subject to the interpretation of the original request by the individual extracting the data
Q1 response: The below reflects the number of offences recorded for the specified period.
|
PRIMARY OFFENCE CLASSIFICATION |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
2024 |
TOTAL |
|
AGGRAVATED VEHICLE TAKING |
54 |
60 |
53 |
71 |
50 |
288 |
|
THEFT OR UNAUTHORISED TAKING OF A MOTOR VEHICLE |
764 |
723 |
1160 |
1088 |
1128 |
4863 |
|
GRAND TOTAL |
818 |
783 |
1213 |
1159 |
1178 |
5151 |
Q2 response: The below reflects the crimes identified at Q1, where a vehicle has been linked to the investigation and where the vehicle link reason has been selected as ‘Recovered’. However, it is important to note that where a vehicle has been recovered but not linked in this way to an investigation then it will not have been returned within the search. For this reason, the information should be treated with caution.
|
VEHICLE LINKED TO INVESTIGATION - VEHICLE LINKED REASON = 'RECOVERED' |
||||||
|
PRIMARY OFFENCE CLASSIFICATION |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
2024 |
TOTAL |
|
AGGRAVATED VEHICLE TAKING |
19 |
17 |
21 |
23 |
8 |
88 |
|
THEFT OR UNAUTHORISED TAKING OF A MOTOR VEHICLE |
320 |
278 |
412 |
275 |
152 |
1437 |
|
GRAND TOTAL |
339 |
295 |
433 |
298 |
160 |
1525 |
Q3 response: The below reflects the crimes identified at Q1, where the investigation has been concluded and where the crime outcome has been selected as ‘Type 1 – Charged/Summonsed/Postal Requisition’. However, it is important to note that the crime outcome will only reflect the most serious outcome for any suspect attached to a crime, i.e, where there are multiple suspects attached to an investigation, the outcome would not take into account ‘lesser’ or ‘like’ outcomes of any other suspect(s).
|
CRIME OUTCOME TYPE |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
2024 |
TOTAL |
|
TYPE 1 - CHARGED/SUMMONSED/POSTAL REQUISITION |
33 |
32 |
28 |
32 |
23 |
148 |
|
GRAND TOTAL |
33 |
32 |
28 |
32 |
23 |
148 |
Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is as accurate as possible. However, it is important to note that the data is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system, therefore care should be taken to ensure data collection processes, and their inevitable limitations are considered when interpreting the data
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB