There were 591 burglaries in St Albans district last year where no suspect was identified, according to recently published statistics.

The month of 2018 with the most unsolved burglaries was January, with 96 in total, while December had the fewest with only 19.

As December was only recently, it is likely many burglary cases remain open while police look for suspects, as the statistics only show burglaries where the investigation was completed with no suspect being found.

Of the burglaries, 464 were in St Albans while 127 were in Harpenden.

There were 872 burglaries in total in 2018, meaning that in 281 cases police were able to identify those responsible.

A Herts Police spokeswoman said: “Tackling burglary and those who commit these offences remains a priority in St Albans as we understand the impact this crime has on victims.

“As part of our ongoing response we have drawn on additional central resources to increase high visibility and covert patrols in our efforts to identify and arrest offenders.

“Our response to burglary may not immediately result in an arrest, but everything is done to ensure all the evidence is captured and we never give up on a case.

“We utilise the full forensic toolkit available to us to build a profile of offenders. This includes, where possible, recovering DNA samples and other identifying material, which is kept on a database that is constantly referred to when offenders are bought into custody.

“Often, when a suspect is arrested on suspicion of committing one burglary offence they will later be forensically linked or admit to carrying out a whole host of other break-ins and we always go back to the victims to update them of this.

“In many of these unsolved burglary cases enquiries remain on-going and we work with other forces to identify offenders who may have come from outside of the area to target homes in St Albans.

“St Albans, and Hertfordshire as a whole, remains a safe place to live and work and whilst statistics give us an insight into crime trends they are just one part of a more complex crime picture that doesn’t fully reflect the harm burglary causes and the work being done behind the scenes to bring offenders to justice.”