SIX people have been arrested on a total of 42 charges as detectives make steady progress into a recent spate of robberies and break-ins at Cairns bottle shops.

Cairns police said two of the six people had been charged with robbery with violence after they allegedly threatened a liquor store attendant then smashed a bottle into the face of a convenience store employee in separate incidents last Sunday.

A special taskforce, Operation Adduce, has been running in Cairns since January. The team, which is made up of detectives from the Criminal Investigations Branch and Child Protection Investigation Unit, is working with liquor store owners and managers to ensure their premises are secure and they have pleaded with the community to be their "eyes and ears" to help catch offenders.

Operation leader Sgt Alex McBroom said while detectives were investigating each offence, the next phase of the operation was to identify how the criminals were carrying out their crimes and to make it more difficult for them to gain entry.

"We’ve got an intensive investigating processes in place to crack who these offenders are but we’re speaking and working with shop attendants, owners and managers to get them to harden up their stores to prevent these brazen crimes," Sgt McBroom told The Cairns Post.

"We’re looking at their security cameras, encouraging them to install or get up to date security cameras. We identify how offenders are gaining entry and work out how they can go about ensuring access cannot be gained that way again.

"We’re also asking the general public to help us out. If they know who the offenders are or witness a break and enter or any suspicious activity, they need to call us immediately."

"The criminals we are dealing with are bold and brazen in their attacks on bottle shops.

"This isn’t a problem that’s out of control but we want to nip it in the bud and by all means, we’ve still got a lot more work to do."

Officers involved in Operation Adduce are also working hand-in-hand with those in Operation Pressure, which targets property crime. Since Operation Pressure began in September 2011, more than 108 people have been arrested to face 345 charges.

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