London’s Phone Theft Epidemic: Met Police Launch Major Offensive Against Organised Gangs
(LONDON) – A phone is stolen every seven and a half minutes in London, making the capital the phone theft epicentre of Europe. In response, the Metropolitan Police are mounting a major fightback against the organised crime gangs behind the epidemic, raiding homes, going undercover and adapting their tactics in pursuit of the snatchers.
The scale of the problem is staggering. In 2024, more than 80,000 phones were stolen in London. Most recent data shows this rate has accelerated to one theft every seven and a half minutes. However, police say only about one per cent of phone thefts in London result in a positive outcome, such as a charge or a caution, a figure they admit is “simply not good enough” and an outlier compared to other crime types which are around the 10 per cent mark.
The fightback, documented by BBC London, involves a multi-pronged strategy. At daybreak, officers from Operation RAW conduct simultaneous raids on eight addresses, targeting a prolific phone-snatching gang believed to be responsible for a large proportion of robberies in southwest London. In one raid, a 17-year-old male is arrested on suspicion of conspiracy to commit robbery, theft, and fraud. Police recover a number of suspected stolen phones and other items, with gangs often draining money from victims’ accounts or using their bank details to purchase other property. Of the seven people sought in the operation, four are arrested.
Many of the snatchers use Surons, lightweight electric motorbikes that allow them to weave through pedestrians, parks and pavements. In response, police are adapting and using Surons themselves. An operation bringing together multiple specialist teams, including plain-clothes officers, CCTV operators and police Suron riders, targets the peak time between 7am and midday. In one instance, a suspect on a Suron is spotted but evades capture. Later that night, a police Suron pulls over a car with suspected fake number plates. A man is arrested after the vehicle smells strongly of cannabis, and it is discovered he was on court bail for a knife-point robbery and is known to be connected to a southern-based snatching gang. Officers say using Surons is having a big impact, stating, “They hate us having them. They hate them being out. They hate seeing them.” However, getting a case to court can take months.
The human cost of these crimes is severe. Genevieve Chenneour, an actress who appeared in the Netflix series Bridgerton, was left with concussion after a five-minute fight with four people who snatched her phone. The man who stole it, Zachariah Bolaras, had previously served 14 months in youth detention for threatening to behead singer Aled Jones with a machete. Chenneour says the experience has made her hypervigilant and reluctant to be out in public. “To be honest, behind all of these crimes is a victim,” she said.
The Metropolitan Police’s newly appointed phone theft lead, Commander Owain Richards, acknowledged the public’s frustration. “Most recent data shows that a phone is now being stolen in London every seven and a half minutes. That’s unacceptable, isn’t it? Oh, absolutely,” he said. He explained that the strategy has been revised, moving from simply responding to thefts to targeting the organised criminals driving the crime type. “Our strategy has shifted and become more precise,” he stated.
Police say this new strategy is exemplified by Operation Reckoning 3, which saw 46 people arrested. The group is believed to be part of an organised crime network that has smuggled up to 40,000 stolen phones to China and North Africa in the past year, representing up to 40 per cent of all phones stolen in London. In China, stolen phones can be sold for up to £4,000 because they can bypass censorship. The operation followed the discovery of a box of phones in a warehouse near Heathrow.
Aerial support is also proving crucial. A helicopter team based in Essex, equipped with powerful cameras, tracks a phone snatcher on a motorbike, guiding ground units. “We are the phone snatcher’s worst nightmare,” said Andrew Lawless, a tactical flight officer. “Once we get overhead, the odds of them getting away dramatically reduce.” The team’s unique perspective allows them to follow suspects through areas ground units cannot access, and their mere presence can act as a deterrent.
On the streets, some citizens are taking matters into their own hands. Delivery driver Diego Galdino has become a pickpocket hunter in his spare time, filming and shouting warnings to potential victims. His posts online have been viewed by millions. “The community is not feeling safe,” he said. Pub landlord Kevin Moran, who has run a establishment in the same area for 35 years, says he sees the same group of thieves repeatedly targeting customers. “They are fearless. They have absolutely no care for anyone’s safety,” he said. “There is no barrier in central London.”
For victims, the impact is lasting. Emma, who has had two phones snatched in six months, chased her attackers for five minutes. Her phone was later traced to Finsbury Park and then to Shenzhen, China, the same journey her first stolen phone had taken. “Even now, I’m just very conscious that when I’m walking out of my home, I just put my phone in my bag straight away,” she said. “That’s not how we should live at all.”
The British Transport Police (BTP) are also undercover at transport hubs like Finsbury Park Station, where thousands of phones are stolen every year. Officers say they are dealing with professional thieves, including one man who travels from Portsmouth to London every day to commit phone thefts. “It is their full-time job,” one officer said. “They are doing it on an industrial level to make a lot of money.” The BTP have identified a network of around 600 thieves connected to one gang. “If we had the time, we would be arresting someone every single day, every single shift,” an officer added.
The theft itself is often just the beginning of a victim’s ordeal. Christian, a calisthenics teacher, lost tens of thousands of pounds after his unlocked phone was snatched by a group of four men. “Everything was compromised from PayPal to the digital wallet. Business bank accounts, loans were attempted in my name, different lines of credit, contactless transactions,” he said. Katarina, who helps protect private clients against online scamming, warns that the worst-case scenario is when a thief knows your PIN. “The entire device is almost fully in the control of a thief when they do know the PIN,” she said. She advises setting up biometric authentication like Face ID and keeping a record of your IMEI number, which can be accessed by dialling *#06#.
Among the highest-profile convictions is that of Spencer Dwarte, a 28-year-old from Saffron Walden. He was dubbed the “Cinderella phone snatcher” after losing a shoe while being forced off his e-bike by members of the public following a theft in August 2024. He was identified through DNA from sweat in the shoe and was jailed for 15 months in September 2025.
Police are also cracking down on the use of illegal electric bikes, which are a favourite mode of transport for snatchers, some of whom disguise themselves as gig economy riders. Officers in the City of London are targeting suspect e-bikes, which are illegal if they exceed certain speed limits. “This doesn’t matter about speed. This is illegal,” one officer tells a rider. “It makes it a motorcycle.”
Despite the new tactics and successes, the battle is far from over. The problem has got worse for years, and many Londoners will take some convincing that the police are winning the fight against the phone snatchers. For the victims, the trauma of a snatched phone can be life-changing, a reality that underscores the urgency of the police’s renewed offensive.
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