Police are launching a crackdown on violence and antisocial behaviour on Aberdeen city centre streets.
Officers will work in tandem with bars and nightclubs to try to stem the rising tide of serious assaults, rowdiness, under-age drinking and drugs-related crime.
Last month, they had to investigate 70 attacks on people in the city-centre area and in the 12 months between May last year and May this year, they issued 718 antisocial behaviour fixed-penalty notices – 561 of them for urinating and disorderly conduct and 157 for street drinking.
Both plain clothes and “high-visibility” officers will be working with staff at pubs and clubs in the latest phase of Grampian Police’s Operation Oak, which focuses on weekend city-centre violence.
Officers expect to hand out a high number of £40 fixed penalty notices for offences over the weekend, as well as giving verbal and formal warnings for various forms of antisocial behaviour.
Last month 62 minor assaults were reported in the city centre, 72% of which have so far been detected by police. A further eight serious assaults were also reported, six of which were detected.
Despite the high number of offenders being caught and punished, police said yesterday that the message is still not getting through to those intent on causing trouble.
Sergeant Cammy Preston, of the police’s city centre unit, said: “My message to those who come in to the city at weekends to socialise is have a good time, drink responsibly and think about your behaviour and how it impacts on others who are visiting, working or living in the city centre.”
Last weekend an off-duty firefighter was hospitalised after an unprovoked assault in Chapel Street. He was hit so hard that he was knocked unconscious and woke up 12 hours later to find that blood was being drained from a clot in his brain.
Just three nights earlier a man was found outside Old Blackfriars bar in Castlegate with a knife sticking out of his face after a fight involving three other men.
During the same week an Aberdeen teenager was jailed for three months for stabbing another man in the head with a glass in Espionage nightclub in Union Street, in July.
From next weekend, further measures will be introduced to curb the number of violent incidents at after-hours taxi queues, which have become a hotspot for trouble on Friday and Saturday nights.
In a move planned by police, working with Aberdeen Community Safety Partnership (ACSP), taxi ranks will be taken out of dark side streets such as Back Wynd and Chapel Street and moved out on to Union Street.
An increased number of taxi marshals will also be used to help protect the safety of those trying to get home from nights out. The aim is increase the number of people who have been drinking using taxis to travel home, both for their own safety and to stop them from causing further incidents when walking home through streets like King Street, Queens Road and Holburn Street.
ACSP chairman Martin Greig said: “Individuals walking home after a night out in a drunk state are particularly vulnerable to attack.
“A great deal of research and consultation has been undertaken to ensure this move will encourage and enable more people to get home safely from the city centre at night.”