Medway recorded 2,836 crimes in August 2026, up 4% on a year ago. Shoplifting rose 34% and anti-social behaviour 21%, while drug offences halved.
Police recorded 2,836 crimes and incidents of anti-social behaviour across Medway in August 2026. That is 109 more than in August 2025, a rise of 4%.
The rise is not spread evenly. Shoplifting was up by a third on a year earlier and anti-social behaviour by a fifth. Recorded drug offences, the crime that depends most on police going out and looking for it, halved.
The figures come from police.uk, which published August’s street-level data this week. We counted every record inside each of the 24 Kent Police neighbourhoods that make up Medway, using the force’s own neighbourhood boundaries. August is compared with August, because crime and anti-social behaviour both rise in summer and a month-on-month comparison mostly measures the weather.
What went up and what went down
| Type | August 2025 | August 2026 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Violence and sexual offences | 999 | 964 | down 35 |
| Anti-social behaviour | 587 | 710 | up 123 (21%) |
| Shoplifting | 170 | 228 | up 58 (34%) |
| Criminal damage and arson | 229 | 217 | down 12 |
| Other theft | 159 | 190 | up 31 |
| Vehicle crime | 122 | 134 | up 12 |
| Public order | 147 | 130 | down 17 |
| Other crime | 78 | 72 | down 6 |
| Burglary | 68 | 62 | down 6 |
| Drugs | 101 | 52 | down 49 (49%) |
| Possession of weapons | 21 | 31 | up 10 |
| Robbery | 21 | 27 | up 6 |
| Bicycle theft | 15 | 12 | down 3 |
| Theft from the person | 10 | 7 | down 3 |
| Total | 2,727 | 2,836 | up 109 (4%) |
Violence and sexual offences remain the largest category, at about a third of everything recorded. They were slightly down on last August.
A fall in recorded drug offences does not mean fewer drugs. Most drug offences are recorded when officers find drugs, often during a stop and search, so the number tracks police activity as much as drug use. In September, Kent Police searched 26 people on Rochester High Street in a single patrol, which falls in next month’s figures.
Compared with July, the month before, the total fell by 84, from 2,920.
Where in Medway
Chatham Central and Brompton recorded the most, as it did in July: 394 records, up from 344 a year earlier. A year ago Gillingham South was the busiest. That included:
- 137 violent and sexual offences
- 81 reports of anti-social behaviour
- 34 shoplifting offences, double the 17 of August 2025
It is also where Kent Police ran live facial recognition cameras in September.
Gillingham South went the other way. It recorded 283, down from 372 a year earlier. Violent crime there fell from 149 to 112, and shoplifting from 28 to 12.
The quietest neighbourhoods were St Mary’s Island with 24 records, All Saints with 28, and Hempstead and Wigmore and Fort Horsted with 39 each.
These are counts, not rates. Police.uk does not publish a population for each neighbourhood, so a busy town-centre area with few residents will always look worse than a large housing estate.
Shoplifting: one spot in Fort Pitt
Fort Pitt had the most shoplifting in Medway: 58 offences, up from 41 a year earlier.
Most of them sit at a single place on the map. Police.uk recorded 44 of Fort Pitt’s 58 shoplifting offences “on or near Petrol Station”. Police.uk moves every crime to the nearest of a fixed set of anonymous map points to protect victims’ privacy. So that label marks a location, not a particular business, and we cannot say which shop the thefts came from.
Two other areas also stand out for shoplifting:
- Rochester East and Warren Wood: 21 offences, against 5 a year ago
- Rochester West and Borstal: 17 offences, against 5 a year ago
Anti-social behaviour: Strood more than doubled
Anti-social behaviour reports rose in most of Medway, but the sharpest jump was in Strood North and Frindsbury. It recorded 77 reports in August, against 36 a year earlier.
Most of those were in the town’s shops. Police.uk placed 29 “on or near Shopping Area” and 16 “on or near Supermarket”.
Three other neighbourhoods also saw big rises in anti-social behaviour on last August:
- Rochester West and Borstal: 56 reports, up from 32
- Gillingham North: 54, up from 39
- Chatham Central and Brompton: 81, up from 65
What it means for you
You can see the crimes recorded near your own street, month by month, on the police.uk crime map. Enter a postcode and it shows your Kent Police neighbourhood team, its priorities and the dates of its next public meetings.
To report anti-social behaviour or a crime that is not an emergency, go to Kent Police’s website or call 101. Always call 999 if a crime is happening now or someone is in danger.
September’s figures are due on police.uk in about a month.
How we counted
Kent Police divides Medway into 24 neighbourhoods. We downloaded each neighbourhood’s boundary from the police.uk API and counted every crime and anti-social behaviour record inside it, for August 2026, July 2026 and August 2025. No record was counted twice. The August 2025 figures use today’s boundaries, so the comparison is like for like.
Police.uk figures are what officers record, and the force can reclassify a crime after it is first logged. They can also change slightly when police.uk republishes a month.
Sources
- data.police.uk, street-level crimes for Kent Police, August 2026, July 2026 and August 2025, queried by neighbourhood boundary on 3 October 2026
- Kent Police neighbourhoods on the police.uk API, Medway’s 24 XA neighbourhoods
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