Tamworth crime: Oxley Chief Inspector Jeff Budd slams keyboard warriors in response to rising juvenile crime in Tamworth

Officer-in-charge of Tamworth, Chief Inspector Jeff Budd, took to the official Oxley police Facebook page on Tuesday morning, sending a message to the community about an increase in juvenile-linked crime across the city.

“We have made over 15 juvenile arrests since just before Christmas. The offenders are linked to multiple offences and are in many cases repeat offenders. They have all been before the courts,” he said.

“Some of these grubs are targeting our elderly and more vulnerable. They wander about just looking for an opportunity, mainly in the evening and nighttime.”

Lately, locals have taken to community pages to spread the word about anyone acting suspicious in their neighbourhood, detailing descriptions of those wandering the streets.

“I am frustrated when I see social media pages where lots of good people are being great neighbors and letting people know when they see suspicious kids or activity,” Inspector Budd said.

“Even more frustrated when I see good people suggesting that the information be passed on to police, only to be shot down by some keyboard warrior who says it is a waste of time.”

He said those ‘keyboard warriors’ were making it hard for officers to disrupt crime or stop offenders in their tracks.

“My experience is that when we do some of these posts it just brings out the crackpots who want to take easy shots (behind a keyboard) at the great police we have here in Tamworth,” he posted online. 

“Ignore the crackpots and please, please give us the information.”

On Tuesday, the Leader revealed a 12-year-old was one of four juveniles arrested for a Hercules Street break-in on Sunday.

Detective Acting Inspector Jason Darcy said police were “actively making arrests” but also said officers needed information to link break-ins and build the cases to arrest those behind the crime wave.

“We need people to report suspicious activity, report it straight away to police, instead of putting it on Facebook, ring police and give a description,” Detective Darcy said.