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  "path": "/2026/04/14/a-stolen-bag-coffee-kilburn-circle-tell-us-crime-london-27912654/",
  "publishedAt": "2026-04-14T05:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "https://metro.co.uk",
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    "News",
    "UK",
    "Crime News",
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  "textContent": "A stolen bag of coffee, which police believe is at the heart of London’s shoplifting problem (Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nThe theft of a bag of coffee is neither the crime of the century, nor is it worthy of national news coverage. Or so it seems.\n\nWhat it represents to Inspector Yu Zhang, who I spent a day with, is a gateway into a seedy underworld connected to a network of many other crimes across London.\n\nCrime in Kilburn has been ticking away over the last few years. A leafy and sunny suburb filled with independent cafes and shops, it should be the chosen spot for anyone to spend a weekend.\n\nBut locals say the atmosphere has changed. Some now feel intimidated walking down the high street, while drug users have been known to use nearby children’s playgrounds as places to shoot up.\n\nThe statistics reflect those concerns. Kilburn, which straddles both Brent and Camden, has a crime rate 96% higher than the national average and 66% higher than other London boroughs.\n\n##  Sign up for all of the latest stories\n\nStart your day informed with Metro's **News Updates** newsletter or get **Breaking News** alerts the moment it happens.\n\nPart of the problem, officers say, is that the area sits between separate police command units.\n\nSergeant Ben Shearman said: ‘We did try and map the crime hotspots in the area, but we realised it was easier to just draw one circle around Kilburn.’\n\n## Operation Terminos\n\nInspector Yu Zhang of the Metropolitan Police leads Operation Terminos (Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nNow the Metropolitan Police has completed Operation Terminos’s Week of Action, targeting crime across the neighbourhood.\n\nInspector Zhang spent months collating data from three units before launching the operation.\n\n‘This has largely been led by the community,’ he said. ‘And is a fresh new approach as we target Kilburn as a whole.\n\n‘What seems like relatively low-level incidents can lead to big problems and feed into larger criminal networks.’\n\n## Shoplifting to order\n\nA mysterious bag filled with coffee which was dropped outside of a Kilburn shop(Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nThat thinking helps explain why officers were called to investigate something as minor as a bag of coffee left outside a shop.\n\nPolice had received reports that CCTV showed a known thief dropping off the bag, filled with unopened packets.\n\nStanding outside the shop as officers questioned the owner, Inspector Zhang explained why it mattered.\n\n‘We suspect shoplifters, who are usually looking for quick money to fuel drug addictions, are given orders on what to steal,’ he said.\n\n‘They then take the goods to smaller businesses, who sell them as their own stock but at a much cheaper price. But this can be very hard to prove.’\n\nThe shopkeeper insisted the man had simply dropped the bag off and said he would return for it later.\n\n‘But how can we prove this wasn’t the case?’ Inspector Zhang said. ‘Yet it’s obvious what has happened here.’\n\nAs officers spoke to the shopkeeper, a steady stream of people tried to enter the shop behind them.\n\nAn oddly large number approached the door, seemingly unaware, or unconcerned, that police were questioning staff inside.\n\n## Business owners in Kilburn frequently complain about shoplifting\n\nAt a nearby Tesco, the aftermath of another attempted theft was still being cleaned up when Metro arrived.\n\nA security guard was mopping the floor where two smashed bottles of red wine had spilled across the entrance.\n\nThe smell hung in the air as he pushed the mop across the sticky floor.\n\nDespite the mess, he seemed remarkably cheerful.\n\nA shoplifter had tried to steal the bottles moments earlier, but smashed them on the ground when he was stopped.\n\nThe guard shrugged as he worked.\n\n‘What’s the point in trying to steal if you just end up smashing them,’ he said. ‘Might as well try and take them.’\n\nAlthough the suspected thief fled the shop, officers later caught up with him and made an arrest.\n\n## E-bikes stopped and seized\n\nA food delivery driver has his e-bike checked(Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nE-bikes and e-scooters impounded at Kilburn Police Station (Picture: Justin Griffiths-Williams)\n\nThe operation has also targeted the transport criminals use to move drugs and stolen goods across London.\n\nOfficers spent part of the day stopping e-bikes, e-scooters and motorbikes passing through the area.\n\nOn the day Metro joined them, five were found to be illegal after being modified to exceed the legal speed limit of 15.5mph.\n\nAt one point I twisted the throttle on one of the seized bikes myself and felt it rev far beyond the limit.\n\nBut not everyone was happy to be stopped.\n\nOne man began shouting angrily at officers as they tried to test his e-scooter, insisting they were targeting him because of his race, even as riders in front of him were also being pulled over.\n\nPCSO Dave Baker said: ‘If they are souped up enough, they are then classed as a motorcycle.\n\n‘And then they would be illegal as the driver would not be insured.’\n\nOne of the knives found during Operation Terminos (Picture: Metropolitan Police)\n\n## Hundreds of stolen phones and knives found\n\nThe clampdown on shoplifting has also led officers to uncover other offences.\n\nDuring the operation, £390 worth of shoplifted medication and beauty products from Boots were recovered, along with two knives and quantities of Class A and Class B drugs.\n\nAnd in their search for where stolen goods were being funnelled, police also uncovered 1,000 suspected stolen phones in the back of a Kilburn shop.\n\nTo view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tvideo\n\nUp Next\n\nPrevious Page\n\nNext Page\n\nFour men, aged 22, 25, 34 and 63, were arrested on suspicion of handling stolen goods, possession of drugs and intent to supply.\n\nInspector Zhang said: ‘Seizures such as this show that we are not only targeting individual phone snatchers, but also those who handle and profit from stolen devices.’\n\nJust hours before the operation began, another example of the area’s problems had already unfolded.\n\nThe Baba Tang restaurant, a few minutes’ walk from Kilburn High Street, had its glass smashed and crates of alcohol stolen overnight.\n\nA staff member told Metro: ‘I came in and the whole front glass was smashed to pieces, and I saw on CCTV this guy carrying out bottles of beer, wine and spirit.\n\n‘It’s cost £300 with emergency insurance. But the way the area is, it was not a surprise.’\n\n******Get in touch with our news team by emailing us atwebnews@metro.co.uk.******\n\n**For more stories like this,** check our news page.\n\nComment now Comments \nAdd Metro as a Preferred Source on Google\nAdd as preferred source\n",
  "title": "What a stolen bag of coffee and the Kilburn Circle tell us about crime in London"
}