Extra security to deal with thugs

Gangs of youths causing havoc in a Black Country parade of shops have prompted security being stepped up.

Police and warden patrols have been stepped up in Owen Street, Tipton, after reports of between 10 and 20 youths gathering nightly and breaking windows. Traders said they were fed up of finding shutters covered in graffiti and the street strewn with takeaway wrappings.

Councillor Derek Rowley, in charge of community safety at Sandwell Council, said: "We have been receiving regular reports of people breaking windows above the shops. They are picking debris up off the street and throwing it. They climb up on to the shops and they graffiti the shutters.

"Every night there are between 10 and 20 of them. We have asked for more patrols to be put in and the police have agreed."

He said shops were hit because the area was nearly deserted at night with no-one seeing what thugs did. He said police community support officers would speak to the youths and take their names and addresses.

Four officers will patrol the area nightly. Jane Guest of the Tan N Tone salon, Owen Street, said: "If we ask them to move away from the shops we just get a mouthful of abuse, even when we are perfectly polite to them. It can be very intimidating.

"They have been climbing on the roof at the back of the Co-Op and they throw their litter on the street even when there's a litter bin just a couple of feet away."

A member of staff at Bains Supasave, a supermarket, said: "They are here in the precinct most nights playing football and banging on all the shutters because they don't seem to have anywhere else to go.

"I could understand how a lot of elderly people would be intimidated to come down here late at night when they are in such large groups. We don't see the youths when we are open during the day, it is the night time that they like to come here."