Author: Klevis Paloka
Mhill Gjoka, a resident of the village of Borizanë, never leaves his house alone. Hundreds of Albanians, mostly elderly people who have turned into house guards out of fear of thieves, act like him. " We are only two old people at home, because our sons are outside, but there are many other people like us, our fear is that they will come to our house next and tie us up, like I heard on TV that they have done in other countries. We are afraid to stay in our house too ," the 78-year-old tells Sinjalizo.
But despite the measures taken to secure the house and property, the thieves entered Mhill Gjoka's apartment and took what they wanted from there. It was impossible to keep the house awake at night.
" When we woke up in the morning, we found the warehouse destroyed and all our materials had been stolen, from the grass cutter to the brandy can ," Gjoka counts the stolen items. In a state of uncertainty for life, just like the residents of rural areas who are vigilant against thieves, the 78-year-old is one of five elderly couples in Albania who live alone and who have unwanted visits from robbers - a police official unofficially tells "Sinjalizo".
Many of them do not report it and it is about the theft of small livestock, poultry, or seasonal products, as Fehti Braza from Tirana tells, who did not go to the police. “ I lit the brandy in Lapraka and in the morning they had emptied it, they took the kettle and 15 liters of alcohol that I extracted from the grapes I bought. Why should I report it? ” asks the old man, who is convinced that the act was committed by some young man who needs money.
Every day two houses
Official police data show that despite the skepticism of not reporting the theft of cattle, bees and household furniture, during 2021 robbers broke into 744 families throughout Albania. So last year, every day it was reported that an average of 2 apartments were stolen per day.
While in total for criminal offenses against property for the year 2021, 4112 criminal offenses have occurred, including bank robbery, armed robbery, violent robbery, residential theft, local commercial theft, vehicle theft. From the calculations made by "Sinjalizo", it appears that, on average, 11 criminal offenses against property per day have occurred throughout Albania.
Also, from the official statistics of the State Police that were made available to Sinjalizo, it results that only 2415 of these criminal offenses have been detected, or 58.7% of them, while 1697 criminal offenses or 41.3% of them remained undetected. While from last year's criminal offenses, in the first 4 months of 2022, only 135 old thefts were discovered.
The ranking for the commission of criminal offenses is headed by other criminal offenses, where out of 2580 criminal offenses, 1631 of them or 67% have been detected, while 949 undetected criminal offenses or 33% of them have remained undetected.
Then the criminal offense of residential theft is listed, where a total of 744 criminal offenses occurred, where only 327 of them were detected or 44% of them, while 417 criminal offenses were not detected or 56% of them.
In third place is local commercial theft, where 484 occurred and 309 or 63.8% of them were detected, while 175 criminal offenses or 36.2% of them remained undetected.
Theft of vehicles is ranked fourth, with a total of 207 cases, of which 71 or 34% were detected, while 3 criminal offenses or 136% remain undetected.
The criminal offense of vehicle theft is listed as a criminal offense where the blue forces have not had a high yield in discovering the perpetrators of these thefts.
As far as the age group of the implicated perpetrators is concerned, it turns out that about 35% belong to the age group of 25-40 years, 41.3% to the age of 18-25 years, minors occupy 8.2% and 16% of different ages. As for the elements, they are drug users, teenagers and minors with social problems.
A total of 3349 perpetrators were implicated, of which 1308 were arrested/detained, 1395 were pursued at large and 646 fled the scene.
As for the crime report from the General Prosecutor's Office for 2021, it results that the highest number of proceedings registered for property theft groups is in the prosecutor's offices near the court of first instance, such as: Tirana recorded 43% of the total number of proceedings registered for these offenses on a national scale, Durrës registered 12% of the total number of registered proceedings, Vlorë registered 7% of the total number of registered proceedings, Elbasan 5% of the total number of registered proceedings, etc. according to the graphic presentation, while it is observed that the smallest number of registered proceedings for these groups of criminal offenses is in the prosecution offices near the courts of first instance, such as: Dibër , Tropojë, Kukës, Krujë recorded respectively about 1% of the total number of proceedings at the country level and Mat, Pukë, Përmet, Pogradec recorded less than 1% of the total number of proceedings registered nationwide for the year 2021, for criminal offenses of property theft.
" In the analysis of the data, it results that the profile of the defendants is 94.04% male, of which 12.84% are minors, 69.4% have up to 9 years of education, 81.78% are unemployed, 6.3% of them are repeat offenders for the same criminal offense, while 12.8% of the defendants are repeat offenders for different criminal offenses. The highest number of proceedings for theft of property was registered in the Tirana First Instance Prosecutor's Office, 43% of them, while the highest coefficient per 100,000 inhabitants results in the Tirana district with 386 proceedings, the Vlora district with 385 proceedings and the Durrës district with 344 proceedings ", states the annual report of the General Prosecutor's Office.
Police: We have designated the risk areas
Asked about the measures taken by the State Police in relation to these criminal acts, Josif Shtëmbari, head of the sector against crimes against property, says that annual analyzes have been made for these criminal acts and the risk areas have been determined.
" Currently, during January of this year, annual analyses were conducted and priority tasks were determined that relate to taking measures first and foremost in the preventive war, analyzing theft situations, trends (businesses, commercial premises, cars or apartments) in every territory in cities and residential centers, determining risk areas and deploying reinforced police Services during those hours where the possibility of committing such criminal acts is greatest ," Štembari declared for "Sinjalizo".
Also, the officer against property crimes emphasizes that the strategy of cooperation is being followed in order to reduce the number of these crimes.
" Cooperation with the community, local government structures and district prosecutors has been strengthened in terms of preventing this crime, giving priority to keeping under strict control persons who pose a social risk and who have been convicted in our country or in various EU countries for theft or other crimes of this nature. Cooperation with police structures in other countries has increased, exchanging mutual information through INTERPOL and Europol on persons who have criminal records in the countries where they have emigrated and currently we have had results and some of the serious crimes against property have been discovered ," the police official explains to "Sinjalizo".
Lots of measures, but even more thieves
But even though, according to the head of the sector against property crimes, measures have been taken, the statistics of the first three months of 2022 show that there is almost the same trend as in 2021 for property crimes. Only for the period January-March 2022, a total of 885 criminal offenses or an average of 10 thefts per day occurred, of which 556 were detected or 63.95% of them, while 329 criminal offenses were undetected or 36.05% of them.
Experts: Home burglary adds to uncertainty
Pëllumb Nako, a teacher of security issues and former head of the police, emphasizes that the theft of an apartment does not affect an individual in the same way as the theft of a car. According to Nako, this increases the feeling of insecurity.
“ Theft of a house and the theft of a car in a parking lot do not affect an individual’s sense of security in the same way. So having your house stolen is more traumatic than having your car stolen, regardless of its value. The fact that the police consider a theft of a large monetary value and another of a minimal value as serious may be the cause of the decline in detection. And this is not the right attitude. If someone has a new car stolen, which has a large financial value, the police are mobilized, while the theft of a bicycle can simply be noted and not be investigated. Meanwhile, the police do not assess in this case the feeling of insecurity that is created in both cases: in the first, although the car is of high value, the victim definitely has the financial resources to buy another one, or to be compensated by insurance. Consequently, this individual is not shocked and is not affected by the feeling of insecurity. Whereas in the case of a bicycle, the victim may be an economically deprived individual and not even "He has no chance of buying another one or even going to work. So the psychological shock that causes him a sense of insecurity is quite great, especially since the police do not put water on the fire ," says former police chief Nako.
Afraid of the thief!
The security barometer in Albania also expresses the uncertainty about thefts. In a national survey conducted by the Center for the Study of Democracy and Governance, 42.26% of respondents consider theft as the main threat to personal security.
"Thefts, conflicts over property, robberies, murders and organized crime activity are perceived as the main threats to personal security. Compared to the last survey, the activity of organized crime (from 4.66 to 10.23%) and domestic violence (from 1.61 to 3.38%) have an increase of more than double the percentage of the results of 2019", says the Safety Barometer in Albania.
