HUNDREDS of serial offenders are being banned from specific areas across Greater Manchester as part of a police crackdown – and they face prison if they break the rules.
Officers are using one particular tool to tackle anti-social behaviour and shoplifting which they say has proved effective.
Criminal Behaviour Orders (CBOs) allow police to ban persistent offenders from specific areas such as town centres, shopping hubs, leisure hotspots or even particular brands and chains.
Since April 2023, hundreds of these orders have been issued across the 10 boroughs – including Tameside and Oldham – with 565 still active. They can range from a few months in length to indefinitely.
Faisal Iqbal Mohammad, 43, from Tameside, has been given an indefinite order preventing him from entering a defined area of Ashton-under-Lyne town centre.
The order – made in response to reports of shoplifting, theft and burglary – allows him to have appointments with official agencies on the condition he leaves the centre immediately after.
In October 2024, 37 CBOs were issued by Oldham’s central policing team to stop problematic shoplifting and anti-social behaviour offenders from entering the town centre.
CBOs are civil orders but breaching them is a criminal offence which can result in being arrested, charged, jailed, fined or being slapped with community service.
The move is part of a no-nonsense approach by neighbourhood policing teams aiming to protect law-abiding residents and businesses from persistent criminality that blights communities.
Chief Superintendent John-Paul Ruggle, from GMP’s Force Prevention Branch, said: “CBOs are a valuable tool to fight crime across Greater Manchester, ensuring that offenders are starved of the areas in which they operate and cause a persistent nuisance to people’s lives.
“The breach of one of the orders can result in an arrest and even imprisonment, which acts as a deterrent to those who think they can cause harm and issues whenever they feel like they want to.”
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