A GROUP of teenagers responsible for a ‘mini crime wave’ in Clevedon, including numerous burglaries, assaults and thefts, have been collared by police.

The three teenagers are thought to have been responsible for 90 per cent of all calls to police in the town for some time and officers finally saw their offending peak when they committed a robbery, a burglary and a couple of assaults in just one night.

For the past two weeks, the town’s beat team has had its work cut-out dealing with the teens, who are reportedly addicted to a substance commonly called Mkat, which is classed as a legal high, and have been offending more and more to feed their habit.

PC Dave Hughes said: “Their addiction got the better of them.

“They were committing offences on a daily basis resulting in this recent binge.

“They have been on a mini crime wave for the past two weeks.

“They have been responsible for 90 per cent of the calls we get in Clevedon for a long time.

“Getting rid of them will mean Clevedon should be a much better place to live.

“Mkat is very addictive and gave them loads of energy but also made them really paranoid.

“They will have just carried on committing crime to fund their habit until they were caught.”

Over the past two weeks, the neighbourhood police team has worked with the Weston-based priority crime team to finally bring the unruly youths, who cannot be named due to their age, to book.

Their recent offences have seen the house of an elderly woman burgled while she was in bed and one man pushed to the ground and kicked in the head before having his wallet stolen.

Two of the youths were arrested on or around August 19-20 and the third was finally arrested following a 24-hour man hunt, which saw a number of police cars spotted in Clevedon’s town centre on August 21.

One has already appeared in court and been sentenced to imprisonment for offences including burglary, theft, criminal damage and assault.

Another is on bail to allow his alleged offences to be investigated and the third has appeared at court for a first hearing but has not yet been fully dealt with.

The recent behaviour of the three teenagers caused some Clevedon residents to fear for their safety and a recent string of comments on the social networking site, Facebook, did suggest some people were thinking of taking the law into their own hands to punish them for their supposed crimes.