Worrying surge in Wick crimes – police operating stop and search policy for ‘suspicious’ characters

The contents of a local police report were made public at a meeting of Wick’s community council on Monday evening (February 3) showing a “noticeable uplift in the amount of persons being arrested”.

Revealed at the Royal Burgh of Wick Community Council (RBWCC) the report was collated by Police Sergeant Brian Hamilton at the station on Bankhead Road.

Sgt Hamilton apologised for not supplying reports over the last few months as he “was off work with a broken collarbone” and unable to attend Monday’s meeting.

In the document shared at the RBWCC, Sgt Hamilton states: “Wick has seen a busy start to the year with a noticeable uplift in the amount of persons being arrested.”

He added that two new police probationers started in Wick in January and “have settled in well”.

The report he submitted states that there were 33 recorded offences in Wick in January 2025 with 10 of these being road traffic related; 4 dishonesty offences; 4 assaults; 1 police assault; 3 drugs offences; 2 sudden deaths and the rest were miscellaneous.

It further states: “As well as this, there were numerous mental health calls. There were 144 incidents reported to police in January 2025 for Wick.”

In a section marked ‘Ward and Local Policing Plan Priorities’ it categorises various areas that the local force is concentrating on which include: protecting people; reducing antisocial behaviour; reducing violence; tackling substance misuse; making roads safer and tackling serious organised crime.

Sgt Hamilton’s report shows that violence remains steady and activities conducted over the reporting period to support those priorities include: regular patrols of Wick having been carried out, and reports of regular anti-social behaviour from the public have directed these patrols to regular areas where this behaviour is worst; drugs misuse remains steady and officers are regularly carrying out searches of persons displaying suspicious behaviour; there were 29 persons arrested and brought into custody during January.

Police Scotland recently published crime stats for a six-month period last year (April to September) stating that teens as young as 14 were detected with weapons and drugs by police stop-and-search officers in Caithness.

The police carried out 81 stop-and-search procedures on people of all ages in Caithness, of which 32 yielded positive results. The data was part of the force’s year-to-date progress report for the second quarter of the fiscal year.