Crime

AN EYE-eagled council worker helped catch a benefits cheat after spotting that bank statements had been faked.
In a bid to continue receiving council tax and housing benefit, bartender Arsim Bajrami, 43, submitted fraudulent Natwest Bank paperwork to conceal the fact that more than £300 of other government tax credits had been paid into his account.

CARJACKERS who robbed a Stanmore man of his BMW - having met him at his local Tube station - were the subject of a police television appeal.
A detective from Hertfordshire Police appeared on BBC1's Crimewatch Roadshow on Monday morning (June 21) to re-issue the closed-circuit television stills of the two crooks and to ask for the public's help to catch them.

A WANTED burglar whose mugshot appeared in the Observer as part of a police appeal has finally been caught and convicted for a Stanmore break-in.
Michael Gordon, 48, was arrested at his home in Leytonstone, east London, in December last year only a short time after the image of his face was circulated in the press.

AN EDGWARE man has been charged by Hertfordshire Police over a distraction burglary which took place last month.
James Cassidy, 20, of Orchard Grove, has been charged with burglary by distraction in connection with the incident in Berkhamsted, west Hertfordshire.
He is due before West Herts Magistrates' Court on March 8.

EMERGENCY services had to deal with three roads crashes in as many days.
At just after midnight on Monday, London Ambulance Service were called to the junction of Whitchurch Lane and Howberry Lane in Edgware where a motorcyclist and a car crashed into one another.

TWO men are to face a jury next month over an alleged killing in Edgware eight months ago.
The trial of Jake Lee, 22, of Heathfield Road, Acton, and Louis Tate, 23, of Rosamun Street, Southall, on a charge of murdering Garry (CORR) Frater will begin on February 15 at the Old Bailey in central London. They denied the charge last September.
Mr Frater died on May 30 2009 of multiple injuries sustained in a collision with a car in De Havilland Road, Edgware.
The 32-year-old, known as 'G' or 'G-Man', lived round the corner in Cobham Close with his mother.

A handbag belonging to a 60-year-old woman was snatched from her on Friday (06/11) in Wetheral Drive, Stanmore, near the junction of Coledale Avenue.
The male suspects, wearing dark clothing, approached the victim from behind and grabbed the bag as they ran past.

TWO bosses of the Edgware Safety Depository where a police raid uncovered drugs, cash and guns will appear in front of a judge early next year along with an ex-colleague.
Milton Woolf, 53, of West Heath Drive, Golders Green, north London, Jacqueline Swan, 45, of Hexham Road, Barnet, north London, and Leslie Sief, 61, of Ranulf Road, West Hampton, north west London, were charged with various offences following Operation Rize.
That was where the Metropolitan Police swooped on the secure storage warehouse in High Steet, Edgware, on June 3 last year and came across not only £19.3 million but handguns, ammunition, fraudulent passports, credit cards, cheque books and narcotics such cannabis, crack cocaine and opiates, and three paintings by 17th-century Dutch artists.
Woolf and Swan, two current directors of Safe Deposit Centres, the company that ran Edgware Safe Depository, Hampstead Safe Depository and Park Lane Safe Depository, and ex-director Sief were charged by police following an inquiry lasting 15 months.
The trio have had their court cases committed to Southwark Crown Court in south-east London where a plea and case management hearing will take place on January 6 next year.
Woolf is accused of:
n possessing ammunition without a firearm certificate or authority;
n doing an act tending and intending to pervert the course of justice;
n having custody or control of a c-ounterfeit of a currency note with intent;
n conspiracy to fail to disclose to a nominated officer or authorised person;
n failure to disclose;
n concealing criminal property;
n having a false instrument;
n possessing false identity documents;
n possessing articles for use in fraud;
n possessing a prohibited firearm.
Swan faces:
n concealing criminal property;
n having a false instrument;
n possessing false identity documents;
n possessing of articles for use in fraud;
n conspiracy to fail to disclose to a nominated officer or authorised person;
n failure to disclose;
Sief faces a single charge of having custody or control of a counterfeit of a currency note with intent.

ANTI-social behaviour in Canons Park could increase if proposals to relocate community police squads out of the ward become reality, residents in Edgware believe.
Harrow Police confirmed that it is looking at moving the Canons Safer Neighbourhood Team (SNT) from its base besides Canons Park in Donnefield Avenue, Edgware, to a new SNT base in a mile and a quarter away in Church Road, Stanmore, to be shared with the Stanmore Park SNT.
The Canons Park base would instead be occupied by the Edgware and Belmont SNTs.
Shirley Sackwild, secretary of Canons Park Residents' Association, said shuffling the officers "made no sense whatsoever" and was "an absolutely farce".
She said: "We have seen the problems there have been with vandalism and youths in the park.
"We are put out if our team is being moved out and another team is being moved in because the park isn't strictly speaking their [Belmont's] responsibility and they are not going to be aware of what's going on in the park.
"The explanation given is that the fact that Canons ward is long and thin and being based in Stanmore would make it easier to reach the north of the ward nearer the border with Elstree.
"But the population in the north is much sparser and the bulk of the population is in the south."
Association members are also unhappy at the way the possible relocation of SNTs was disclosed to local residents.
Mrs Sackwild said the plan was raised only under the 'Any Other Business' section of the most recent Canons SNT ward panel meeting by an inspector as if it was a throwaway, inconsequential news item.
Community representatives on the panel believe it should have an agenda item in its own right so they could have a full debate about the proposals and the possible impact on policing.
Mrs Sackwild said: "For something of this importance for the ward panel, it felt as the police were treating the ward panel with contempt.
"To add insult to injury, apparently there was a public meeting of the Stanmore Society on the same night and they were discussing it quite publicly when our ward panel hadn't even had the courtesy of being informed.
"We have now lobbied our MP and want a meeting with the police."
A Harrow Police spokesman said: "We will shortly taking ownership of a new Safer Neighbourhoods base located in Church Road, Stanmore.
"We propose that this will house the Stanmore Park and Canons Safer Neighbourhoods Teams.
"The Lodge in Canons Park would then be used by the Edgware and Belmont Teams.
"We believe that this will benefit the operational policing of these wards and the borough as a whole. We await formal ratification of these moves."
n Only in July did the Observer run a similar story about residents' concern over the relocation of Harrow on the Hill SNT from West Street Police Station in West Street, Harrow on the Hill, to a new base at Kirkland House in Peterborough Road, Harrow.

THE body of an "older man" was found at the scene of a fire in a house in Watling Avenue, Edgware, on Sunday morning.

Ten firefighters - five from Stanmore and five from Mill Hill - made the grisly discovery during the 20 minutes it took to tackle the blaze, which broke out at just before 10.10am.

A spokesman for London Fire Brigade said the cause of the fire is under investigation.