Cracking down on countryside crime

The days when victims of crime in Clydesale’s remote areas don’t even bother to report the offence to police because `nothing will be done’ should now be over for good.
Campaign launch earlier this yearCampaign launch earlier this year
Campaign launch earlier this year

That was the conclusion of a meeting last week by those involved in running a crackdown on countryside crime, launched at Lanark Market in the summer.

As reported in the Gazette, the local police were keen to get the message out to farmers and residents of the Upperward villages and hamlets that they WOULD be listened to when reporting crimes and their complaints WOULD be acted on by officers.

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At the campaign launch senior local officers told the Gazette of their increasing frustration at members of he public in our remote areas complaining that they weren’t even reporting crimes as they assumed no action would be taken.

This, felt the police, left them in a Catch-22 situation with some members of the public critcising them for not acting on crimes - offences they hadn’t even been told about!

Now there is no excuse for non-reporting, the police announcing after Monday’s meeting in Lanark that a special email `hotline’ for rural crime has now been created so that information can been quickly seen and acted upon by officers.

After the meeting of the Lanarkshire Rural Crime Group, which includes police, farmers and members of the rural community, Constable David Wesencraft, Clydesdale Community Safety Officer, commented: “We strive to improve contact from, and incident reporting by rural communities in respect of both wildlife and rural crime.

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Police Scotland have introduced a designated email address for Lanarkshire rural crime intelligence that allows our officers to have a single point of contact for all intelligence updates received from farmers and the rural community throughout this division.

“This will also enable officers to react quickly to any intelligence in relation to rural crime in the division.

“That email address is: [email protected].

“We are keen to increase rural crime awareness across our division among officers so that victims have confidence in reporting incidents. Police Scotland is pleased to work in partnership with those who live, work and are affected by wildlife and rural crime to improve the lives of our rural communities and businesses; keeping them safe.”

“Farmers and rural residents can deter criminal activity by the timely sharing information with neighbours and Police Scotland.”

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