<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=0 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR>Crimes up in lifts
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->PEOPLE do not just commit anti-social behaviour in lifts - but crimes as well.
In the first six months of this year, there were 174 cases of serious crime in lifts, compared to 146 in the same period last year. The most common types of lift crimes are robberies, snatch thefts and outraging of modesty cases.
Such crimes, the police said, also occur at common areas of HDB blocks such as lift landings and void decks.
It has prompted a joint project islandwide between all the town councils and the police to install closed-circuit television (CCTVs) in common areas in all HDB estates, including void decks, town centres and carparks.
Dr Teo Ho Pin, the coordinating chairman of all 14 People's Action Party town councils, said: 'The cameras are roving electronic eyes. We shift them around every once in a while so would-be criminals won't know how to avoid them.'
Sembawang Town Council has installed 63 CCTVs while Bishan-Toa Payoh Town Council has a quarter of its estate equipped with CCTVs.
Some residents, though, feel CCTVs should be monitored round the clock, otherwise it is pointless to have them.
'It's no point if the CCTVs just record what's going on, but there is no human eye to catch the activities,' said a Sembawang resident who gave her name only as Madam Lim.
Dr Teo said they will monitor how effective the cameras are and decide later whether to increase or reduce the number of such CCTVs deployed.
TAN WEIZHEN
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<!-- START OF : div id="storytext"--><!-- more than 4 paragraphs -->PEOPLE do not just commit anti-social behaviour in lifts - but crimes as well.
In the first six months of this year, there were 174 cases of serious crime in lifts, compared to 146 in the same period last year. The most common types of lift crimes are robberies, snatch thefts and outraging of modesty cases.
Such crimes, the police said, also occur at common areas of HDB blocks such as lift landings and void decks.
It has prompted a joint project islandwide between all the town councils and the police to install closed-circuit television (CCTVs) in common areas in all HDB estates, including void decks, town centres and carparks.
Dr Teo Ho Pin, the coordinating chairman of all 14 People's Action Party town councils, said: 'The cameras are roving electronic eyes. We shift them around every once in a while so would-be criminals won't know how to avoid them.'
Sembawang Town Council has installed 63 CCTVs while Bishan-Toa Payoh Town Council has a quarter of its estate equipped with CCTVs.
Some residents, though, feel CCTVs should be monitored round the clock, otherwise it is pointless to have them.
'It's no point if the CCTVs just record what's going on, but there is no human eye to catch the activities,' said a Sembawang resident who gave her name only as Madam Lim.
Dr Teo said they will monitor how effective the cameras are and decide later whether to increase or reduce the number of such CCTVs deployed.
TAN WEIZHEN
