Cuckooing

What is cuckooing?

Cuckooing is a practice where people take over a person’s home and use the property to facilitate exploitation. It takes the name from cuckoos who take over the nests of other birds.

There are different types of cuckooing:

• Using the property to deal, store or take drugs
• Using the property to sex work
• Taking over the property as a place for them to live
• Taking over the property to financially abuse the tenant

The most common form of cuckooing is where drug dealers take over a person’s home and use it to store or distribute drugs.

How we deal with cuckooing

Swindon properties have been targeted by drug dealers operating County Drugs Lines from larger cities such as London and Birmingham.

We work with Wiltshire Police, and other support services to protect vulnerable people from cuckooing in Swindon.

All cases follow reports from neighbours or professionals who raise a concern about a vulnerable person. Following a report, Wiltshire Police and Swindon Borough Council carry out regular visits to cuckooed properties.

We have a number of tools and powers to remove the people who are exploiting and keep the tenant safe. In  more extreme cases, Swindon Borough Council and Wiltshire Police will work together to obtain closure orders or injunctions on the cuckooed properties.

Closure orders restrict who can enter the property. Breaking a closure order is a criminal offence punishable by imprisonment, meaning police can immediately arrest unwanted people found in a home with a closure order on it.

Signs of cuckooing

Signs that cuckooing may be going on at a property include, but are not limited to:

• an increase in people entering and leaving
• an increase in cars or bikes outside
• an increase in anti-social behaviour
• increasing litter outside
• people coming and going at strange times
• damage to the door/the door propped open
• unknown people pressing buzzers to gain access to the building
• you haven't seen the person who lives there recently or, when you have, they have been anxious or distracted

How to report cuckooing

If you have concerns that a neighbour or somebody you know is being cuckooed, you can report it to us using the from below:

Report cuckooing online

You can also call Wiltshire police on 101 or, if it is an emergency, call 999. We will keep your identity confidential where possible.