Published: Thursday, 25th October, 2007 09:00
Partners in petty crime crackdown
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EXTRA uniformed officers are being drafted in to boost the fight against anti-social behaviour and petty crime in North Berwick.
The crackdown follows months of vandalism and intimidation of residents by gangs of drunken youths in the town centre and the Lochbridge Road area.
As well as maintaining a high visibility presence at selected times, police will mount regular joint patrols with officers from East Lothian Council’s anti-social behaviour unit in a bid to quell the trouble.
The moves herald the launch of the Police and Community Partnership in North Berwick, which meets for the first time on Thursday (November 1).
Under the scheme, community representatives directly task the police to tackle a maximum of three items for the following month. Speeding, parking and fly-tipping are also among the range of subjects that can be put forward as priority cases.
The system was successfully launched in Musselburgh last year and extended to Dunbar last month, when parking congestion and drunken youths on the High Street were the focus. Early reports from Dunbar – where police have flooded the town centre on Friday and Saturday nights – have been positive, according to the man in charge of rolling out the CAPP programme across East Lothian.
Inspector Sean Scott, head of community policing for Haddington, North Berwick and Dunbar, told the Courier: “A high visibility police presence can be very effective. It is meant to act as a deterrent and also to reassure the public.
“In their ‘Contract with the People’, the council are committed to putting more police on the beat. We are working closely with them to ensure this happens, but we don’t have an unlimited budget, so we have to maximise our resources as best as we can.”
Insp Scott joined an officer from the anti-social behaviour unit for a walking tour of selected North Berwick’s streets on Friday night.
The two-and-a-half hour exercise was aimed at assessing potential trouble spots. It followed a protest by a group of Lochbridge Road residents at the last meeting of the local community council, against on-going vandalism, teenage drunkenness and two violent assaults – one involving an axe and the other, baseball bats.
Insp Scott pointed out: “We need to keep things in perspective. There were two relatively serious crimes reported in a short space of time in September, but they were isolated incidents in terms of what has happened before in North Berwick.
“However, there are quality of life issues in North Berwick which I fully understand and am sympathetic towards. Rest assured, we are taking steps to address youth disorder and anti-social behaviour.”
In the latest incident, a large window at The Grange restaurant on High Street, was maliciously smashed at around 1.50am on Sunday. Anyone with information is asked to contact North Berwick Police Station on 01620 893585.
Meanwhile, police are in talks with the council and community councils about the proposed installation of CCTV in all six of the county’s major towns.
l Pictured above is Matt Sandison, head chef and owner of The Grange Restaurant, alongside the boarded-up window, deliberately smashed in the early hours of Sunday.
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