Burglars targeting Asian homes for gold, says UK police

London:  More incidents of burglars targeting gold and jewellery in houses belonging to British-Asians have come to light, with police issuing guidelines to the community that is known to traditionally preserve family jewellery for generations.

The latest spate of burglaries for gold has been reported in Leicester, which has a large population of Indian origin.

The police say that only items of gold jewellery were stolen during the burglaries in Spinney Hills, Highfields and Evington.

Reports of houses belonging to the Asian community being burgled have prompted the police and local councillors to launch special awareness campaigns in various towns across Britain, such as Birmingham, Slough, Ealing, Reading and Bradford.

Leicester-based police official Alan Cook said: "Asian gold is generally of a higher purity than other gold and is attractive to thieves."

Sergeant Dan Eveleigh, of Spinney Hill Park police station, said: "We are seeing an increasing number of house burglaries in this area and are concerned about the number of occasions when Asian gold jewellery is being stolen."

He added: "As warmer weather arrives, it's very easy to leave doors and windows open in error, and burglars will take every opportunity to steal."

Several jewellery shops owned by Asians have been targeted in Leicester, among other towns across Britain.

The price of gold is currently at a high of 1,100 pounds for an ounce.

Amidst the spate of burglaries, the police have issued specific crime prevention advice that urges members of the community not to keep gold items at home, among other measures.

Steve Smith, of the Thames Valley Police force, said: "Ideally, we would prefer for people not to keep high value gold at home given what we are experiencing, not only in areas of our force but nationally, due to the value of Asian gold and its purity."

The police issued detailed guidelines to the community to prevent crime, including details of safes, insurance, keeping an inventory of jewellery owned, keeping photographs of the items, to use forensic marking to identify jewellery and to register all valuables on a free online Immobilise database.

Some areas in the south of the Thames Valley have particularly suffered from this type of crime in recent months, the police said and added that over 200 offences have been reported to police since April last year in Berkshire.

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