Police are warning that strong action will be taken against anybody making false allegations that a crime has been committed after a man made a bogus claim that he was robbed of his mobile phone in Horn Lane.

The 21 year old man from the NW10 area attended Acton police station on 12th October claiming that his phone had been snatched from his hand by three black youths the previous day.

Police made enquiries with the victim's employer, which revealed that the victim had reported the phone lost to his employer approximately 2 weeks earlier. A statement was taken from the victim's manager, and when this statement was put to the victim, he admitted to making a false report.

The male was arrested the next day at his workplace in Park Royal, for perverting the course of justice. In interview he stated that if he had reported the phone lost, he would have had to pay £250.00 to his employer to replace the phone. However if he reported it stolen to police and obtained a crime reference number he would not have to pay for a replacement. There is no suggestion that the employer told the victim to report the phone stolen. The male was issued with a Penalty Notice for the offence for Wasting Police Time, which carries a £80.00 fine.

Detective Superintendent Chris Foster, Ealing Borough Police said, “We recognise that a small minority of the public make false reports to police about crime. Often this is to validate an insurance policy concerning the theft of property but can also include those occasions where lies are told to cover up the true circumstances of an incident. Crime investigation is resource intensive, false allegations of crime can be misleading when analysing crime patterns and will only divert our resources away from reducing crime across Ealing Borough. .”

It is important to give Ealing Borough Police the correct facts when reporting a crime as making a false allegation is a criminal offence. Therefore each victim of robbery or theft on Ealing Borough is asked to read and sign a crime declaration form, which underlines that in the event of police identifying a false report the offender will be prosecuted.

Recently released statistics show that robbery has increased sharply in certain areas of the borough over the last year.