DOZENS of youths had their masks confiscated in a police crackdown on Halloween.

For the first time in Waltham Forest, officers were granted powers to ask people to remove Hallo-ween masks if they believed they were being used to commit crimes.

Police seized more than 60 masks in Leyton and Chingford in a bid to tackle robbery and anti-social behaviour.

Det Chief Insp Simon Rose said: "In the last couple of years we have we have had big problems with people using face covering and commiting robberies on Halloween, because they think they are less likely to be stopped.

"Intervening at an early stage prevents anti-social behaviour."

The powers were granted under Section 60 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act DCI Rose said that there were five robberies in the borough on Halloween this year, compared to 11 last year.

Officers approached groups of older youths. They then checked their details on the national police computer and asked questions to determine if they were likely to commit a crime.

If officers believed they were, they took the masks away, and they will now be destroyed.

DCI Rose said: "We have not been targeting the large numbers of young children supervised by parents."

He added that that the stops also led to two arrests for possession of drugs with intent to supply and two arrests for actual bodily harm.

He said: "The Section 60 powers are very blunt and strong, and because of that, officers were given a very detailed briefing beforehand.

"We apologise to anyone who genuinely believed they had their masks taken from them unnecessarily."