Vehicle-Enabled Crime

Freedom of Information (FOI) Act request ref: 01/FOI/26/010360/O

Version Date: 02/09/2026

The Performance & Analysis Department has provided the following information:

Searches were completed within Niche from 01/01/2021 to 31/12/2025 with the entry method selected to ‘Ram Raid’. The returned data was reviewed for relevance.

Please note the following caveats/limitations:

• No crimes/Cancelled Crimes excluded
• Restricted crimes excluded.

I am writing to request the following information under the Freedom of Information Act 2000, for each calendar year 2021–2025, or financial years 2021/22–2025/26 if that is how the data is held (please state which basis is used). Counts based on the date on which the offence was recorded are acceptable.

This request is for aggregate counts only, drawn from your crime recording system. No manual review of individual crime records or case files is required. For the purposes of this request, "structured code" means a structured modus operandi (MO), method-of-entry, attack-method, asset-type, or equivalent recording code.
(a) Vehicle-enabled crime against business/commercial premises — please provide, separately:

(i) The number of recorded Burglary (Business and Community) offences where a structured code indicates a vehicle was used to breach the premises; and

(ii) The number of recorded Robbery of Business Property offences where a structured code indicates a vehicle was used to breach the premises.

If your system cannot readily separate these two classifications, a single combined count for (a) is acceptable, provided you state that the figure is combined.

Where a structured premises- or asset-type code allows retail premises to be identified separately, please also provide the retail-premises subset. If no such distinction can readily be made, the broader business/commercial premises count is acceptable, provided the scope of the figure is stated.

Between 01/01/2021 to 31/12/2025 there were no recorded Burglary (Business and Community) or Robbery of Business Property offences where a structured code (MO Data Entry Method: Ram raid) indicates a vehicle was used to breach the premises.

(b) ATM-targeted crime: the number of recorded offences, under whichever classification your force uses to record attacks on automatic teller machines (e.g. Theft, Burglary, Criminal Damage or Robbery of Business Property, as applicable), where a structured code indicates that a vehicle was used — whether to breach the premises, to physically attack the ATM, or to remove or attempt to remove it.

Nil return

(c) EV charging infrastructure: the number of recorded Criminal Damage offences where a structured code indicates damage to an electric vehicle charge point caused by vehicle impact. If this cannot be identified from structured codes without reviewing individual records, please state that this information is not retrievable from structured fields. No alternative or keyword-based figure is requested for this part.

Nil return

(d) Only where the information requested in (a) and/or (b) cannot be retrieved using structured codes, please instead provide, for each year, the number of distinct recorded offences returned by a free-text search of MO fields, crime notes or equivalent searchable fields for one or more of the following terms: "ram raid", "ram-raid", "ramraid", "rammed the shutter", "rammed the door", "drove through the shopfront", "drove through the shop front", "vehicles used to gain access" and "vehicles used in the commission of the crime". If your system cannot de-duplicate records matching more than one search term, raw hit counts by term are acceptable, provided you clearly state that records may be counted more than once. No manual validation or review of the returned records is requested, and I accept that the results may contain false positives or incidents outside the intended scope, provided that limitation is clearly stated in your response. If searching all fields would exceed the cost limit, a search of the MO/method field alone is acceptable. A single combined count covering both (a) and (b) is acceptable where the search cannot distinguish between them.

Not applicable.

If the estimated cost of complying with the request as a whole would exceed the appropriate limit under Section 12, please treat the following as my preferred refinement of the request, to the extent necessary to bring it within the limit: first (a), then (b), then the free-text search in (d), and finally (c), and, within each element, the most recent years first. If further refinement is required, I would welcome advice and assistance under Section 16 before the request is refused.

I am content for counts below 5 to be reported as "<5". Where individual annual counts are reported as "<5", please also consider providing the unsuppressed total across the full 2021–2025 (or 2021/22–2025/26) period, where this can be disclosed without creating an identification or other disclosure risk.

If easily stated without further searching, please also indicate:
— Which offence classification(s) each count falls under; and

Not applicable. As mentioned above, searches resulted in a nil return.

— Whether "ram raid"-type incidents are recorded under a specific MO, attack-method or method-of-entry code at your force.

Yes, MO Data Entry Method: Ram raid.