FOUR people have been arrested after early morning raids were carried out by Gwent Police.

At around 5am this morning, officers carried out six warrants in Caerphilly and Torfaen in relation to suspected organised car theft and car cloning offences, as well as other serious organised crime related offences.

The raids took place at four residential properties in Griffithstown, Graig-y-Rhacca and Caerphilly and two commercial properties, one on The Highway in New Inn and the other in Greenway Bedwas House Industrial Estate.

Four people from the Caerphilly area - two men aged 36 and 31 and two women aged 45 and 29, have all been arrested on suspicion of burglary, conspiracy to commit fraud, conspiracy to handle stolen goods and theft of motor vehicles.

During the warrants, quad bikes and two Polaris beach buggies were seized along with car keys and other equipment suspected to be related to criminal offences.

Police Constable Rhys Jones who led on this operation said: “This was an intelligence led operation based on months of work by our teams and information received from members of the public.

“Our investigations and these warrants today, are aimed at tackling those who profit from preying on people in our communities. Our work to tackle organised crime is important to stop these crimes taking place.

“Information from the public is so important – you see what happens in your local areas and know when something is suspicious or out of place. Please do contact us and know it will be dealt with seriously.

“If you have any information about serious organised crime in your community, please call us on 101, or ring Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

“Alternatively, you can send a direct message with information via our Gwent Police Facebook or Twitter social media pages.”

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The warrants were carried out by specialist officers including: specialist method of entry and search trained officers as well as investigators from our CID teams, Gwent Police said.

Partner agencies have also been involved including Trading Standards, RSPCA, HMRC and DVSA.