crime rate

Description

José Briá finds it hard to sleep these days. Sometimes when he wakes up in the middle of the night, he drives out to his farmland a few miles from the center of this tiny village just to make sure everything is all right. He has been robbed three times already this year: Once, chickens were taken. Then, some tools vanished. The last time, eight rabbits disappeared. Mostly Mr. Briá, 62, worries that the thieves, who cut his locks, will get careless and let his sheep out of the barn to trample across his neighbors' fields. "Do you realize how much damage that would do?" he asked. "Do you know what sheep are like when they are scared?" The farmers in Albelda have gotten so worried about thieves that they have taken to patrolling their fields at night, their cars bumping along between rows of peach and pear trees. They have found strategic spots that overlook the fertile valley here in northeastern Spain, and from there they peer into the dark, watching for headlights or flashlights, or any signs of intruders. Such vigilance has helped, they think. But for many, it is a sorry state of affairs. For a long time, many of Spain's small, isolated farming communities seemed all but immune from the economic crisis. The fields still needed to be plowed and the animals tended. Prices were not that great, but no one was really out of work. Now, however, many of the farmers believe the problem is at their doorstep. "You don't steal eight rabbits to sell them," said Rosa Marques, 43, who grew up in this village of 800 and is one of the organizers of the patrols. "You steal eight rabbits for food." Albelda is hardly the only farming village where people are worried about rising crime. Police officials say they have seen a steady rise in the crime rate in rural areas since 2009. Just about everything is a target. Three hundred onions one night. A rubber irrigation hose the next. In Albelda, thieves have taken diesel fuel, nail guns, electric clippers — even shampoo and soap that workers use. Elsewhere in Spain, particularly in coastal regions like Valencia where there is a lot of farming, villagers are organizing themselves into patrols, too. It is not a trend that police officials like much. But they understand it. In many areas, there are too few officers to cover acres and acres of farmland. And yet there are few useful alternatives to a watchful eye. "You can't put doors up to protect fields," said Maj. Jesús Gayoso, an analyst for the Guardia Civil, Spain's military police. Police officials say the criminals mostly fall into two categories: local people who are out of work and steal enough to subsist, and more organized bands of Romanians and Moroccans, who once worked in these areas and know them well. They sell whatever they can collect at cheaper prices. Sometimes, Major Gayoso said, stolen tools are melted down and the metal is shipped to China. Over all, officials say, crime in Spain has been falling slightly. But because of changes in 2010 in the way such statistics are gathered, true long-term comparisons are difficult. And the decrease is not in all categories. Homicides and drug trafficking appear to be decreasing, for instance. But other categories are rising. Last year "robbery with violence and intimidation" went up 10 percent compared with the year before. In the same period, "robbery with forced entrance into homes" rose 25 percent, according to Interior Ministry statistics. Thefts in the countryside account for only 5 percent of the crimes in Spain, according to Major Gayoso. But this is small comfort to the residents of Albelda, who were used to leaving their doors unlocked. In Huesca Province, which surrounds Albelda, 41 thefts were reported in the first three months of 2012, the major said. There were 63 in the same period this year. Villagers say that sometimes they just do not bother reporting them. The thefts, however, have changed the way they do things. "All of our lives we were safe," said José ...