In the last six months a number of women have been raped during home invasions in the western and eastern districts, but police failed to report those incidents to the public, the Bahama Journal has learnt.

Officers have been tight-lipped on the specifics and insist they’re trying to protect the interests of those involved.

Over the last few days, reports have surfaced about some recent home invasions where some of the victims were sexually assaulted.

On Monday during a news conference at police headquarters police admitted that that has in fact been the case in a number of burglaries in the last six months, although they did not include that information in their daily crime reports.

During that briefing Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Anthony Ferguson refused to speak to the specifics except to say there has been close to a dozen instances both in the western and eastern areas.

“From the information we gathered, there are about four cases in the eastern area and another four cases in the western area. The incidents in the west span over the last six months and the incidents in the east in the last couple of weeks,” ACP Ferguson said.

According to Mr. Ferguson, in some of the invasions there are two perpetrators involved while in the others there is only one suspect.

However, he could not confirm whether the incidents were in any way connected.

“We believe that we will make some inroads in this and find the persons responsible, but we cannot say that all of these matters are being committed by the same people. So we have to look at this carefully as we probe these investigations. And from our analysis we see that these crimes are happening after 2:00 a.m. to about 6:00 a.m.”

When asked whether home invasions were on the increase, ACP Ferguson said no.

However, with these incidents presently under investigations, he advised residents to take precautions.

“Be alert as to who might be following you when you’re going home. If you see a vehicle following you for any length of time, do not pull up in your yard. Instead, we advise you to go to the nearest police station and alert them that you believe you are being followed.”

“Once you do this, officers would be more than happy to check the area for you and also to make sure that you get safely into your home. The police have been active with respect to these investigations and we have stepped up our patrols in the area among other things that we are doing which I wish not to speak about.”

ACP Ferguson said the police are making all efforts to apprehend those involved and are appealing to members of the public that may have any vital information to come forward.