Salisbury Police joining national knife crime crackdown
Officers in the city are working on Operation Sceptre this week.
The national campaign is aimed at reducing the number of knife crimes across the country, with Wiltshire Police having taken part for a few years.
Normally, it might involve a blade amnesty at local police stations, and officers going out to schools and colleges, but the pandemic means things are a little different this year.
Salisbury Police say they'll be patrolling known hotspots for knife related incidents in the city.
They'll also be 'taking proactive action' against offenders suspected of carrying blades illegally.
Officers will also be hosting a live Q&A session on the Salisbury Police Facebook page on Friday lunchtime (13th November).
From 1.00pm, they'll be talking through our concerns about knife crime in the city.
We can submit questions to police through their social media to be answered during the session.
Wiltshire Police Superintendent Phil Staynings said:
“We know that knife crime is often inextricably linked to other types of criminality, including child exploitation and illegal drugs.
“We see children and teenagers drawn into this activity, usually at a low-level at first, but this criminality quickly escalates and eventually can include serious violence.
“As a police force we need a strong, visible police presence in areas where we know there is a problem, using community intelligence to target those known offenders and get drugs and weapons off our streets.
“But this will only have a long-term impact if we work closely with partners to ensure the relevant support is in place to either help teenagers back on the straight and narrow or, ideally, stop them getting involved in crime in the first place.”