CRIMINALS travelling between Cheshire and Merseyside were greeted with more than a surprise today as officers from both forces took part in Operation Crossbow.

Aiming to disrupt illegal road activity between Cheshire and Merseyside, the joint action targeted vehicles with links to crime and disorder.

They met in Widnes at dawn today to mount the operation.

Dete Chief Insp Paul Beachamp from Cheshire Police, said: "Criminals rely on the road network to enable them to commit criminal offences.

“They don’t view force boundaries as a bar to committing these offences and will often cross borders to conduct their activity. There is a link between the illegal use of vehicles and other serious crime.

"Working with partner agencies and colleagues from Merseyside Police we are deploying a great range of resources and have access to technology and intelligence such as Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR), which is an excellent tool to identify offenders and bring them to justice.

"Uninsured drivers pose a threat to other road users and we are able to identify them, take them off the road and make the county’s road network much safer for legal road users.

"Cheshire and Merseyside Police are committed to working in collaboration to proactively target those who choose to commit crime to fund their lifestyles and days such as today are set to continue’’.

Ch Insp Chris Gibson, from the Merseyside Police Matrix Serious Organised Crime team, said: "We are relentless in our pursuit of organised crime and will use a whole host of tactics to disrupt criminals working in our region.

"Today′s operation was focused on restricting the ability of criminals to travel on the region′s networks and provides us with an effective way of reducing their ability to commit crime.

"We want to ensure that motorists travelling on the regions′ roads can do so safely and to send out the message that we take robust action against anyone found to be involved in criminal behaviour or driving illegally."

He added: "We continually use our resources and ANPR technology to bring offenders to justice, recover stolen vehicles and to reduce crime in our communities so be warned - if you are using a stolen vehicle or any other vehicle to commit crime, you will be caught."

Both Cheshire and Merseyside police are keen to remind the public that they too can help keep our roads safer by reporting illegal use of vehicles to the police on 101. Alternatively information can be reported anonymously through Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111