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Guernsey Police have been trying to stop anti-social behaviour in St Peter Port over the last few months, with officers saying they've had some success.
A concerted operation to tackle the issue saw 27 arrests made between the beginning of November and the end of January.
This was off the back of a similar summer operation, which saw 38 arrests made within three months.
But the aim wasn't only to make arrests - it was to raise the police profile in order to deter and disrupt any behaviour considered "anti social".
"The purpose of this operation was to deter, detect and disrupt anti-social behaviour and criminality. Specifically we wanted to reduce the number of reported assaults, criminal damage and other public order offences – an objective we achieved," Chief Inspector of Operations, J-P Le Breton, said.
Pictured: The operation reduced the likelihood of an offender being moved on, only to cause trouble elsewhere.
“This was a data driven deployment which saw us use our resources to effectively target and deal with issues which take place in the night-time economy. St Peter Port is the island’s main Town where people, especially near Christmas, go to enjoy themselves after the working week and to celebrate the festivities in December. We take the community’s Town evening safety seriously, and we don’t want to allow the minority to ruin it for the majority of people.”
Guernsey Police used high visibility patrols in and around the island’s main nightlife location where they took a low tolerance approach – when no more than one warning was issued – to anti-social behaviour, aggressive behaviour and drunken disorder. The operation was focused between 22:00 and 03:00 on Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.
Pictured: 27 arrests were made between November and January.
Of the arrests, 10 were for common assault, four for disorderly behaviour in a public place, three each for possession of a controlled drug and being found drunk in a public place, and the others variously for criminal damage and public order offences.
In addition to the arrests, eight stop-search encounters were carried out along with 12 liquor licence checks.
CI Le Breton added: “Although the official operation has ended, the low tolerance approach to anti- social behaviour has not. We will continue to review our data to design operations around the areas it is indicating to us needs additional focus.”
Pictured top: Guernsey Police have been targeting anti-social behaviour.
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