Police Scotland
Argyll and Bute Council · 1 November 2023
Back to Mid Argyll, Kintyre and the Islands Area Community Planning Group — 1 November 2023 and its agenda
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Mid Argyll, Kintyre and the Islands Fraud Prevention and Awareness Our popular and educational Scam Savvy Quiz inputs have continued across the reporting period with inputs provided in partnership with the Dochas Centres in Campbeltown and Lochgilphead and to residents on the Isle of Islay. These talks are useful to raise awareness without raising fear and are available for any community group or local organisations including community councils. There are further inputs being planned for Tarbert and a further input on Islay.
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One of the most common scams that we continue to see across MAKI has been around Sextortion. This almost wholly is targeted to young males (under 30 years of age). Sextortion is sexual extortion. It involves the threat of having sexual information, photos or videos shared. This is done to get money from the victim, to control behaviour or to pressure them for further images. Many sextortions start with seemingly harmless flirting on social media or dating sites. Criminals are experts at creating fake profiles that appear genuine. Flirtatious conversations quickly turn sexual and the victim is actively encouraged to remove clothing, perform a sexual act on camera or share explicit images. These images and videos are often recorded without the victim’s knowledge and then can be held to ransom. The criminals will often have already accessed your social media contacts and will threaten to share these images with them unless you comply with their demands. As young males are being told their images will be shared with everyone they know, this is having an impact on their mental health with victims often feeling embarrassed and ashamed they are often keeping themselves isolated rather than reporting to Police and reaching our for support. Police Scotland would encourage everyone to share awareness around this either through social media, newsletters or in conversation with young males you know. If any members have ideas or suggestions on how we can help education young males on the risk involved with this type of offence.
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Bereavement Support Local officers meet people affected by bereavement as part of their daily role. Officers are now able to provide family and friends of deceased person with a full support pack which has practice advice and emotional support contacts. Working with Argyll and Bute Registrars, NHS Highland Chaplaincy, Argyll and Bute Citizens Advice Bureau, Change Mental Health and Cruse Bereavement, packs provide those suffering from bereavement with advice they can look at when they are ready to and aims to reduce distress. Road Safety Following a fatality on the Argyll road network involving a towing vehicle, a series of Safe Towing videos have been produced and shared via our social media channels. This follows a change in legislation around driving licence requirements for those towing trailers, caravans, boat trailers and horseboxes. Police Scotland worked with a DVSA approved assessor in Campbeltown to produce these videos. These aim to help people understand legal towing limits, hitching, unhitching and safety checks. A Partnership Approach to Road Safety group is being formed with representation from across West Dunbartonshire and Argyll and Bute. This group will focus on locations of concern and key contributing factors from road traffic collisions where someone has been killed or seriously injured to enable us to prioritise education and enforcement towards key locations or demographics. Community Intelligence During this reporting period, officers in Argyll and Bute have seized Cocaine with an estimated street value of £25,000 following the execution of warrants in Campbeltown. A bar of gold, worth £1,500 and a three figure sum of cash were also seized. Half a kilogram of cocaine was seized following a road traffic stop in Lochgilphead. A male was charged with a number of drug and traffic related offences. Local officers will regularly make routine vehicle stops to check documentation, and can often detect those who driving under the influence of drugs through speaking with them. Under the Misuse of Drugs act 1971, officers can search vehicles for controlled drugs where they have reasonable grounds to suspect there are drugs on board following routine traffic stop.
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Our local policing teams continue to robustly police those who deal drugs in our community and we work with partners and the public to encourage the capture of information to help us secure these drug search warrants.