Concerns raised over public sexual activity in woods in Wakefield

Concerns have been raised over public sexual activity taking place in woods in Wakefield.

It’s taking place near a country lane near West Bretton and is an ongoing problem, a meeting has been told.

Horse riders have previously raised concerns about men exposing themselves in the woods next to Top Lane, a West Bretton Police and Communities Together (PACT) meeting heard on Tuesday (September 22).

A member of the public said female horse riders had raised concerns at a previous PACT meeting, adding: "They complained about people jumping out and exposing themselves in the woods. They were saying it's very common."

Police Community Support Officer George Sykes told the meeting the meeting that Top Lane - which runs between Denby Dale Road and Bar Lane - has been a problem area for a number of years.

He said: "There was issues with males meeting each other for sexual gratification and it would cause a lot of problems.

"Round there you have got a lot of dog walkers, horse riders and obviously it's not something they would really like to see.

"There have been multiple reports to ourselves. We have tried and tried with a police presence but there is only so much we can do being there for half-an-hour at a time."

PCSO Sykes added: "We have not had any recent calls about it but that's not say that it isn't happening."

Helen Brailsford, Wakefield Council's head of communities, told the meeting that the council and police are taking a multi-agency approach to try to tackle the problem.

She said: "From a council perspective, and obviously from the district councillors - working with police colleagues - they are taking this really serious in terms of residents' concerns so we have had more of an active presence up there trying to disrupt the activities that you have touched on.

"I can't go in to too much detail at the moment but we are looking at if there's any more long term solutions that we can implement as a council in that particular area.

"I'm hoping that at the next PACT meeting I might be able to give some more details.”

She said the council is proactively looking at "a couple of alternative solutions."

She continued: "What I'm keen to do obviously is disrupt the activity so we are going to continue to be up there.

"Our enforcement officers, council vehicles, trying to encourage people not to be down there. We are monitoring the situation as well.

"We are getting a new CCTV van. I've asked if that can be up there as well. I think we would probably want to work with police colleagues around that."

She added: "It's just really to let residents know that we absolutely take the concerns on board and we are proactively trying to see if we can do something longer term up there."