Vital footage of thugs caught smearing Nailsea town center with graffiti has been accidentally deleted following a software glitch. Police are said to have visited the North Somerset Council Town Hall’s CCTV control room center to view footage capturing the vandals at work in the High Street in February.
But when they arrived, they were told the footage was gone. The deletion of the footage was due to an issue during a £400,000 upgrade to all cameras in North Somerset
Normally images are retained for 28 days, but as part of the system change, Nailsea’s films were deleted after 21. A spokesperson for Nailsea City Council said: “There has been a deletion of images captured in Nailsea High Street.
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“This was due to the upgrade while the cameras moved to a new system. The new software meant that footage was deleted after 21 days instead of 28.”
The issue has apparently been resolved and it is “unlikely” to reoccur. Yobs have smeared the city with offensive graffiti and tags in recent weeks. Last month, bus stops were defaced as well as buildings and fences in the city center and surrounding streets.
The yobs smeared graffiti on Nailsea (Image: Nailsea People)
Nailsea Councilor James Steel said: ‘It is disappointing to hear of the technical issue which removed footage from Nailsea High Street on the night the vandalism occurred. All new systems have boot problems to begin with. Although disappointing, all issues that I understand have now been resolved and we hope for a new, more transparent system from now on.
Vandal attacks continued, however. In the latest attack, along Lodge Lane and Backwell Bow over the weekend, the culprits sprayed phallic images on buildings. Flax Bourton town hall was also covered in offensive graffiti.
Nailsea Police Sergeant Lee Kerslake said: ‘We have worked on the graffiti issues at Nailsea and continue to do so. This investigation has been frustrating, however, we hope to have updates soon.
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“I am aware that there is growing public concern about this and I can only at this stage say that we are working hard to identify the person(s) responsible. We hope for a positive update soon.
“We are, however, very keen to receive any additional information that would lead to the arrest of those tagging Nailsea. Although we have leads to follow, our success always depends on the information we receive from the community. Crime is a community issue, we as police operate within the community to deal with it.”
North Somerset Council has 71 CCTV cameras across the district – mostly in town centers – with 11 cameras in Nailsea. There are also 45 cameras in and around Weston-super-Mare, nine in Clevedon and six in Portishead.
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It is unclear if the software glitch caused other footage to be deleted. The previous cameras – also known as the North Somerset Public Space Protection System (PSS) – had been in place for over 20 years.
The upgrade cost £400,000 and saw all cameras replaced with high definition digital wireless replacements. High-tech cameras will provide clearer, higher quality images, which will help in pursuits.
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Source: www.somersetlive.co.uk
This notice was published: 2022-03-22 15:01:30
