Average burglar today is drug user

"IF WE got rid of larcenies from cars and burglaries," Sgt Pat Clavin tells his unit as he briefs them for the evening shift in Dun Laoghaire yesterday afternoon, "we'd, get rid of most of our crime".

The old-fashioned burglary looms large in the daily life of DMA East. The days of burglars taking televisions and videos may be gone - too many households have them now for their resale value to justify the work involved in stealing them - but the targets have simply become smaller.

Camcorders and CD players have replaced the TVs and videos, and jewellery, cash and compact discs themselves are the hard currency of the modern burglar.

CDs have a large resale value, according to gardai, except classical ones, which are treated with disdain by the average house-breaker.

Another change is that the average burglar these days is probably a drug user. Except in the case of the very wealthy, drug habits have a way of outgrowing income and only crime can bridge the gap.

Furthermore, detectives believe a majority of Dun Laoghaire's criminals are HIV positive and, when approaching individual criminals, always work on the assumption that they have the virus.

But when detectives Declan Mallon and Neil Randles started their patrols yesterday morning they had a few other things on their minds.

For one thing, a young woman has been hospitalised overnight after a savage heating by another young woman on Dun Laoghaire's East Pier. The attacker was identified by the victim and if the detectives see her this morning they'll take her in: "There was no point arresting her last night - she was too drunk."

But burglary inevitably rises on the agenda. The first stop on the beat today, for instance, is a building site from which a power saw and a pneumatic hammer have been stolen. The missing tools have since been strongly implicated in a raid on a shop in which the burglars entered through the roof.

When they call to the site, the gardai learn that the £3,000 worth of equipment has been recovered, via intermediaries.

This solves half the immediate problem. The issue of where it was in the meantime is another day's investigation.

The drugs connection raises its head, too. On the tour of the town, the detectives drive into the grounds of the old Pavilion cinema, now a haunt of many of Dun Laoghaire's drug users and "cider-heads".

Even at 11 a.m., there are several people on site and there is evidence that most of them are drunk or high, or both.

On seeing the detectives, two of the group walk calmly but briskly towards the exit - an action guaranteed to draw attention even if the gardai don't know them, which they do. One of the duo is a heroin addict. He is also one of the area's more active criminals - it usually follows.

A search of the latter is justified on suspicion of drugs but reveals only an empty wallet and a "clean set of works" - a new packet of syringes bought from the local chemist.

With nothing to hide on this occasion, the suspects are positively cheerful and enjoy a bit of banter with the detectives. But they'll probably be meeting again before too long.

"We'd have our finger on half to two-thirds of all crime because it's local people," says Det Garda Declan Mallon. "The rest is outsiders off the DART or druggies, and often that will remain unsolved unless we catch them on the hoof, which we do sometimes."