Public fear of burglary and concern at the high number of violent offenders on Waikato streets drove the police to name 11 wanted criminals.
Waikato police last Omega Replica Watches week took the unusual step of releasing the names to the Waikato Times. The men are wanted in connection with Operation Persil, a police operation targeting burglary, violence and dishonesty crimes.
So far, three of the 11 offenders have been caught, five are being "eyed" by police and three others are proving elusive.
Waikato police Area Commander Inspector Allan Boreham said the latest clamp-down came after an alarming upward trend in burglaries. "We ran this operation two years ago and we ran it in a relentless way for a number of months and the burglaries dropped off . . . because it appeared that the core people were locked away."
However, those that had been jailed were inevitably released, sparking a spike.
"You can't lock these people up forever . . . when they come back out, and if the commodities are easy to steal or sell or dispose of or trade, then, until that changes, these people will do it as soon as they come out. Most of them are career-type criminals."
Mr Boreham said he would keep Persil running until he was "satisfied that we've got the lid on burglaries".
Police had launched Operation Persil after surveys catalog printing of the public kept showing that burglaries scared people.
"We're not currently the most burgled city in New Zealand if you go by population, but we are a challenged city," Mr Boreham said.
"Burglary is a problem for us and in every survey citizens always tell us that fear of their homes being burgled is a major concern . . . It is a crime that is a challenge for New Zealand as a whole."
Mr Boreham said other projects in the pipeline included targeting stolen property and increasing neighbourhood policing teams, which had worked in suburbs like Melville.
When questioned about wanted offender Danny Mooney's comments in Thursday's Waikato Times - Mooney labelled the wanted campaign "a joke" - Mr Boreham was unimpressed.
"These guys know brochure printing how to play the system - but we have to be relentless with them, we have to be uncompromising . . . they're in a peer group that encourages it."
Mr Boreham said Hamilton burglary data showed that crime was heavily commodity driven. Their next goal was to shut that down.
"We believe there's not enough deterrence around the property as an easy commodity," he said. "Literally they can use it as a currency; plasma TVs, electronic cameras, laptops, playstations are literally used as a currency.
"People will trade directly on those things and can then get them on the white market . . . so we're going to look at a community partnership to try and shut that down and that's what we're in talks about at the moment."
Mr Boreham said he was proud of the work his Persil team had done so far. "They're doing a good job, its a lot of work, takes a lot of staff but we are being relentless."
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