Police on the beat have caught up with an alleged prolific offender in central Auckland.

Auckland City Central Area Prevention Manager, Inspector Dave Christoffersen, says the Auckland City Beat team located a person of interest while patrolling on Tuesday afternoon.

“Through diligent investigation work, Police identified a man believed to be responsible for a significant number of dishonesty offences.

“It is alleged these incidents spanned across businesses all over Tāmaki Makaurau, several of which were in the last four weeks.”

The 67-year-old man was arrested without incident and has since been charged in relation to this offending.

“He was due to appear in the Auckland District Court this morning on 15 charges relating to shoplifting, burglary, and unlawfully being on property,” Inspector Christoffersen says.

“Police have opposed bail.”

Police will allege the scale of this offending has resulted in significant losses to a number of individuals and businesses.

“It is estimated the alleged offending totals around $6,600.”

Inspector Christoffersen says there is no place for this behaviour in our communities.

“These victims are hard-working members of the public and we hope that this resolution reassures them that Police are continuing to investigate and make arrests in relation to these types of reports.

“We continue to encourage anyone who has been a victim of this type of offending to report the matter to Police so we can investigate.”

If an incident is happening now, please call 111. To report an incident after it has occurred, you can contact Police via our 105 service.

© Scoop Media