Children as young as four have been arrested for crimes in Merseyside as the number of children being arrested soared.
Figures released to the ECHO under a Freedom of Information request have shown thousands of children under 13 were arrested across our region in a three year period.
Just over a third of these arrests were for violent crimes, as hundreds of primary school children and older were held.
The startling figures revealed 2,216 children were arrested between January 2016 and December 2018.
Five of those suspected criminals were just four years old.
Children were arrested for a litany of reasons, including for serious crimes such as rape, arson, drug trafficking and sexual offences.
Boys and girls were also arrested for less grave crimes, including theft of a bike and criminal damage.
But the number of children arrested has reached a three year high in Merseyside, as officers made 254 more arrests in 2018 than in 2016.
Merseyside Police said the reason crime was on the up can "largely be attributed to improvements in the recording of crime, including the force working a lot more closely with partners to identify and record offences, in line with Home Office standards."
The majority of children were held on suspicion violence with injury and violence without injury, as a a huge 1,011 were arrested.
CEO of M.A.L.S Merseyside, Claire Donohue, said she was not surprised the number of arrests had risen, because the number of vulnerable children being exploited is growing.
Claire said the charity works with police, youth services and youth offending services to help young and adult offenders through preventative work and when they are released from prison.
She said: "It's not a shock to me because we're out there and seeing it, and we are seeing more and more young people being exploited. It's scary.
"A lot more needs to be done with young people and we need to reach them at a young age."
Claire said youngsters are falling into crime because they are often targeted by older people to commit offences.
She said: "Most of them are targeted because they're young people who haven't got anything, and they [gang members, older people] are preying on that vulnerability.
"Because I work with adult offenders as well, I'm meeting people who are saying when they first offended when they were younger, they were exploited as well."
Claire added: "Now it's getting worse and worse because they're getting younger people to commit crimes. They're saying to them 'nothing is going to happen to you', but they end up getting prison sentences.
Data released to the ECHO also revealed which policing ward saw the highest amount of youth crime, committed by those under 13.
Liverpool - the largest police ward - had the highest recorded crimes, with 688 children arrested.
Next was Wirral, with 510, St Helens with 388 and Sefton with 358 young people held. Knowsley had far less, with 272 crimes recorded.
Claire said the charity is doing effective work in helping youngsters and adult offenders. She said the charity "would never turn anybody away who needs help."
Working with parents and children, the charity works with ex-offenders and people who have been through challenging situations to work with young people.
She said: "We have people who they can directly relate to."
As well as this, the charity also does preventive work by going into primary and secondary schools to steer young people away from a life of crime.
More information about the work M.A.L.S Merseyside does can be found here.
