Police hunting a vandal who targeted cars in a Moray town have charged a 44-year-old woman.
She was detained by officers probing incidents in Buckie’s Seaview Road and James Street.
Nearly £1,000 of damage was caused to a white BMW X3 when it was scratched with a key, and it is believed other vehicles were damaged in a similar fashion.
As part of their investigation police have examined CCTV images of a woman dog walker captured in the area where the vandalisms took place.
BMW owner Shona Coull recorded footage of a woman beside her car on the home security system she had installed after someone thew a rock at the vehicle.
The 43-year-old has estimated she is facing a £960 bill to repair the damage caused in the keying incident.
She said: “When I saw the footage I was taken aback.
“We would not have been able to guess at anyone who might have done this without having those cameras there though.
“It was fortunate, in a way, that if this had to happen then we were able to get it on film.
“If not for that it’s unlikely police would have had anything to go on.”
The footage has been posted online and was viewed more than 300,000 times in little more than a day.
The 20-second clip appears to show a woman scraping a key along the length of the £15,000 4×4 vehicle’s left-hand side.
After watching the clip, Facebook user Kelly Hale described the vandalism as “disgusting behaviour”, and Laura Wilson said it was “just awful”.
Buckie councillor Gordon Cowie said: “A lot of people in the town are quite concerned about this, it’s just shocking vandalism.
“It may not look like a lot, but damage like that costs a huge amount of money to repair.”
Last night, police confirmed a woman had been charged.
A police spokesman said: “A 44 year-old female has been charged in connection to three vandalisms to motor vehicles.
“A report will be sent to the procurator fiscal.”