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00:00the highlands and islands of scotland is britain's biggest beat i'm injured
00:09with the car on fire i've got three wounded persons it is really easy to underestimate
00:15the highlands patrolling 12 000 square miles of mountains lochs and islands we're gonna need a
00:23launch to be able to go out and get this boy lifted and searching for suspects deep in the
00:29wilderness please show yourself the highland cops must go above and beyond to protect their
00:37communities we realized it was human remains so came back down and found the police i think in the
00:43highlands the blue line is very thin tackling traditional rural crimes it's absolutely
00:48related with shotgun pellet it's clear evidence that these birds are being persecuted and crimes
00:54that plague the nation oh good effort the bags of a white crystalline powder if you're getting one
01:03person off the street then it's like you've done your job this series goes inside the uk's most
01:10distinctive police force we are close we live in close-knit communities all right let's go we look
01:16out for each other to find out what it takes to walk the beach there's monkeys there's parrots
01:22it's all completely a lot of our comfort zone and keep the peace you're just threatening to kill
01:27it it seems you were going to strangle it in some of the most beautiful and wild places in the uk
01:33i sometimes feel that people think that maybe policing in the highlands is the the easy option but
01:53that couldn't be further from the truth whilst we might not be dealing with as much criminality then
02:00maybe our colleagues in cities we dedicate a lot of our resources towards mental health issues
02:07missing persons mountain rescue scenarios so it's a different type of policing but we're definitely busy
02:15here
02:24in the shadow of ben nevis lies fort william
02:32tourists visit from across the world
02:34but it's also home to 15 000 people who rely on the local police to keep them safe
02:44on shift today is sergeant katie duncan there's no rhyme nor reason to your day because you're
02:51responding to incidents that are happening all the time the first call of the day comes in
02:58a report of a violent assault that's still ongoing katie and sergeant sean knox need to get there as
03:06quickly as possible
03:07another police car is just ahead of them so that's the first unit just arrived at the locust just
03:19nice so we're just waiting for an update from them as they drive more information comes through on the
03:26radio a man has been attacked by a woman in a report that there's a young female there with a a nice
03:39by now the victim has managed to escape so the cops go in pursuit of his assailant
03:46it's that block of flats there isn't it
03:47hey hello is there anybody here in please please what's your name she's admitted to
03:59that's where we can see them just now you got anything sharp on you no you got anything on
04:04you shouldn't have that'll hurt you or hurt me okay i'm going to give you a quick search okay
04:10you're not obliged to say everything you do say will be noted to me bees and evidence do you understand
04:15it's in there where's the knife where's the knife where did you put it in the kitchen it's in the
04:20kitchen is it still there a glass why have you got that on you
04:28for an incident em such as a serious assault emotions are quite high and sometimes it can be
04:34really challenging to try and get the information from people as to actually what has happened
04:38do you locate the knife we'll take it back to the car with the knife seized sean's attention moves to
04:52the victim hi sorry to draw out he's been treated for a cut to his head in you okay where's your injury
05:01can i see it uh there yeah i think it started bleeding again right enough but okay it's about
05:06a 35mm off okay okay are you in a relationship with her no no friends we're kind of like seeing
05:13each other but was it just you two in the house yeah yeah it was yeah okay she had a knife like
05:17down her body warmer and i just tried to get it off her so she didn't do any stupid and then that's
05:21when she just picked up the glass and just layered it off my head right and that's when i just kind
05:25of like walked up the hall and it was bleeding that's like she was just kind of like walking up the
05:28hole with a knife and that and i just kind of shut myself in the bedroom okay and then my mate came
05:31down got me out of there so all right okay that's fine i'll let my colleague just finish off the
05:36statement just now but we have an ambulance coming to see you when we deal with any domestic incident
05:52it's sad to see that a relationship has ended up where the police are involved
05:56i think it's always quite sad when very young people are involved in it
06:01but i just think it's really important that domestics are dealt with properly
06:11with the suspect in custody the next priority is finding the glass she allegedly used as a weapon
06:17there's evident signs of a disturbance taking place in this kitchen area with the broken glass and it's
06:21also where we found the knife it's consistent with the witnesses statement though i'm just uh going
06:28to retrieve as much of the glass as i can i believe some of it's been put in the bin as well that was um
06:35a bit of the glass that's exactly described um from the male that was injured and there's
06:40there's blood staying in on it as well so four two one from one two one go ahead
06:48then sean gets an update from katie the suspect has described the knife she had as a black handled
06:55hunting knife yeah received certainly the one that we've got doesn't match the description of a
07:03hunting knife we'll maybe show them it and see if that's the one of the same just to make sure
07:11we're getting new information in all the time some of the information we receive isn't always accurate
07:18so it's important that we establish what is fact and what isn't that was the only knife that was on
07:24the worktop all right no that's not it no i should have been enjoyed it enough but no that wasn't it
07:30i could pop in and have a look on that yeah well you could take him back into the house to try and
07:34find that knife yeah yeah with the victim's help sean eventually does find the knife involved
07:43it's another crucial piece of evidence he's confirmed that it was this knife it's not a typical
07:50domestic style knife that you'd find within a property and it could do some real damage
08:01you okay yeah just watch your head all right a decision will now be made about what charges
08:10the suspect will face okay just come and stand here we have calls regarding domestic abuse domestic violence
08:19once a day three times a day every domestic incident is dealt with in the same way regardless of
08:27whether the the victim is male or female the welfare and well-being of the victim is the most important
08:34thing
08:46the highlands is a unique environment
08:51but it has not escaped the scourge of drugs
08:53for inverness cid disrupting the drugs trade is a never-ending battle
09:03thanks for coming along the intention today is to execute the three drug search warrants within the
09:09same block this is a day of enforcement in relation to the scouse and a county lines group
09:15they've been present in inverness for just over a year now
09:21detectives ashley templeton and duncan bus are preparing a simultaneous raid on three addresses in
09:27the city their intel suggests that all three flats have been taken over by a serious organized crime
09:34group from liverpool they're quite prominent in the county lines inverness highlands world and they
09:41they're punting out a lot of crack cocaine and heroin in the area typical county lines model they'll
09:47utilize a number of addresses in order to assist them with their supplier controlled drugs and after
09:52every few days they'll change addresses to avoid detection from the police
10:00if we can carry out enforcement on a number of addresses at the same time brilliant because
10:06there's more chance of positive results so this is a block we're going to this is taken from the road
10:12which as we approach will actually be the rear of the block
10:17the area it's built up large blocks of flats with no main roads really to get access to them so
10:26groups that deal drugs that use that area usually have a good vantage point
10:31it's one of the safer places for them in inverness and we end up there quite a bit
10:42these are the people attached to the block ashley primes his colleagues to look out for known
10:48gangsters several are believed to be dangerous he is one of the more prominent figures in the drugs
10:54supply world in inverness he has potential to be violent we've not experienced it with the police
11:01but people do say that he has been violent previously with other people so he's willing
11:05to bear in mind if he is there moving on he is the one person that has shown violence to police
11:14he tried to kick a police officer in the face he has got bail conditions not to be in scotland
11:18and the other nominal he's been caught a few times in inverness now with controlled substances again he
11:25has bail conditions not to be in scotland they are capable of serious and violent crime these people
11:32are desperate the the drugs that they're holding is everything they have we'll just fill her off into
11:38the teams we'll get dropped off in the car park we'll make our way to the addresses and we'll just
11:55force entry as quick as we can hopefully the doors might be unlocked for ease
11:59if people see these vans they know what's about to happen so they might just put a blanket text out and
12:09then people start panicking there's always a level of apprehension and an unknown risk within that address
12:18the three raids are carefully synchronized while ashley joins the raiding teams upstairs
12:31duncan's team breaks into the ground floor flat
12:34the raiding teams upstairs
12:51i've got to caution you both
13:04for common law that you don't have to say anything but from this point anything you say can be noted
13:08and used as evidence with the first stage of the raid complete it's time to take stock
13:21in the first flat on the ground floor duncan has found a woman at home with her two dogs
13:26upstairs the second flat is empty
13:39my son is upstairs and in the third another woman is at home with her brother and some youngsters
13:47this is ridiculous man do you have a reason it's all going to explain to you
13:51there's a reason we don't just randomly go into people's houses there's a reason
13:54burst in stage one of the raid is complete but for ashley the job of gathering evidence and
14:02detaining suspects is just beginning there are reasonable grounds to suspect that evidence
14:07pertaining to the set of fences is with this is basically just a long worded way of saying we
14:11have a drugs warrant to search this house for drugs and anything that's why well the information we
14:17can't go into like how we've got here but we have information that's come first that says there might
14:22be drugs in this address so we're here we're not going to wreck the house we're going to search the house
14:29what is going on
14:36what is going on
14:4880 miles southwest pc stephen cooper's beat covers vast mountain ranges giant sea lochs and picturesque
14:58villages the challenges of policing this area are unique every day is different whether that's somebody
15:04that's lost on the mountain or somebody that's been involved in a road traffic collision or somebody
15:08that's having a mental health crisis
15:12today stephen's responding to an urgent call
15:16police in dundee a hundred miles away are tracking a car on this road they're worried about
15:22the welfare of the driver and have asked stephen to intercept him
15:25just trying to catch up with a high risk or what's described as a very high risk
15:32missing person whose car is being tracked through the glencoe area it's an electric mg
15:40and apparently the hire car company are able to track it so
15:44he's heading westbound so we're just going to try and catch up with it
15:47oh sit there control three two whiskey i have vehicle trace glenco
16:01someone's reported concern for you that's why i'm stopping the vehicle in this manner
16:04are you okay
16:08yeah from three two whiskey i'm just conversing with the guy just now i'll get back to you
16:10one stephen tries to find out if anything's wrong but the driver seems to be having difficulty
16:17communicating and writes down what he wants to say that's fine yeah from three two whiskey
16:24acknowledged um just trying to converse with the gentleman just now but he's struggling to speak
16:28so it's all through pen and paper
16:32okay i understand that but someone's reported significant concerns about your well-being
16:38so we have a duty to make sure that you're assessed and something happens to help you with that
16:46okay um i get you're struggling i do get that but we need to make sure that you're okay and we
16:54i'm not saying you're lying to me i can't just take your word for that my thoughts are just to try and
16:58keep the situation calm try and speak to him try and figure out what's going on he was writing that he
17:04was fine didn't need any help and couldn't understand why i was speaking to him i get
17:10you're stressed just chill okay okay i understand that that's understand what you're saying
17:19at this point given what i've been told i can detain you under the mental health act okay
17:24i can do that that makes your life more difficult okay
17:34control three to whiskey that's that vehicle making off i'm gonna have to try and chase it
17:39yes yes it's an electric vehicle and i couldn't get any keys off him
17:44control can send backup but they need to know the location and currently
17:49stephen doesn't know where this pursuit will lead him it's a extremely dangerous situation he's in a
17:56very fast accelerating car he needs to be stopped he needs to be brought to a safe stop and to prevent
18:04injury to him and other members of the public uh northbound 82 just approaching glencoe village
18:11just trying to gain ground on it now but i've lost sight
18:12yeah received once i catch up with that i'll try and give commentary so you know where you're going
18:22after a couple of minutes the driver pulls up at a petrol station and tries to escape on foot
18:29yeah from three to whiskey vehicle stop mail running
18:35mail running claymore filling station glencoe stop there now stop stop we are
18:40stay we are calm down just relax relax okay no one wants to hurt you we're just trying to help
18:52you okay at this point i'm thinking is he intending to try and complete suicide potentially by jumping
18:59in front of a moving vehicle my priority is safety of him and safety of the other members of the public
19:04so i'm getting in between him and that road and i'm stopping him from getting anywhere near anywhere he
19:08can do himself harm that's my first thoughts just chill i've got no reason to handcuff you at the
19:15moment okay i don't want to do that that's not what you need okay just i know i understand that just
19:24relax just take a seat just take your seat and relax okay because of how you've just acted i'm gonna have
19:30to get you assessed yeah okay you understand that yeah okay that's what i'm gonna tell you is what's
19:35gonna happen all right i'm not gonna lie to you you're gonna need to be assessed right you've just
19:39driven away from me you've tried to run away from me the serious concern about your well-being i cannot
19:43leave you on your own right understand that that's that's not gonna happen what is gonna happen is
19:48i'm gonna wait for a colleague to come that's fine the air from three to whiskey the vehicle's secure
19:58i'm just conversing with the gentleman now i told him he's gonna need to be assessed he's
20:02calming down and we're working on it but i could do with someone here sooner rather than later
20:07while stephen waits for backup he needs to get the man somewhere safe and controllable
20:13luckily he knows just the place that's the police station over there okay we'll take you in there
20:19and we'll just have a seat in the wee waiting room and we'll have a chill out okay we get you a cup
20:23of tea coffee water whatever you need okay yeah it's in my pocket okay as they walk stephen chats
20:33to the man about how he needs to change the tire of his police car i was just speaking to him and
20:38trying to calm the situation down in this incident i'm wearing a couple of different hats for different
20:43jobs you're wearing your police hat for bringing him to a safe stop and getting him contained but then
20:50you quickly put your social services hat on to try and bring him to a point where he's calmer and just
20:57able to get the help he needs inside the station the man can be kept comfortable until an ambulance
21:05arrives to take him to hospital for a mental health assessment it's hard work dealing with someone like
21:10that it's just trying to keep them right and try to deal with them properly and appropriately but
21:16i've done it quite a bit now so you get kind of used to it and you get used to what not to say
21:20and what to say and how to handle people and it's just being compassionate and treating them like a
21:24human being not trying to tell them what to do with the man safe stephen can get his tire changed
21:40the man safe stephen had that situation arisen in a city where there was backup sort of right in the
21:47corner potentially an officer would have been more than justified in rugby tackling that guy and
21:53taking him to the ground because my backup was potentially half an hour away if i was to do that
22:00i'm then gonna have to fight with him for half an hour and that's gonna be dangerous for me gonna be
22:04dangerous for him right cheers colin
22:22in inverness police have just raided three flats they believe are being used by a criminal gang to
22:28deal drugs i do not do drugs one of the occupants is furiously protesting her innocence duncan you're
22:38i always start searching upstairs so now the officers need evidence that their intel was correct
22:48when we go through a door like this obviously your adrenaline's up and there's that because you don't
22:51know what you're going to meet on the other side once we know what we're dealing with we take a
22:55wee pause and then it's time to initiate the plan of searching and divide up the teams and we'll be
23:02looking for any sort of signs of drug paraphernalia any drugs themselves that would be related to this
23:09address that have been used in the local area this is somewhere that we believe that drugs are being
23:14distributed from
23:19we're quite competent in looking for things but you have to think
23:23like someone who's selling drugs where am i hiding things you know where will the police not look
23:30duncan's detained the occupant of the ground floor flat
23:34a little bag of herbal substance is on the dining table in the living room but so far the search hasn't
23:40turned up any class a drugs and without stronger evidence he'll have to let her go
23:46he turns his attention to the outbuildings do you have a shed key i'm just saying there a door
23:52which shade is it dark brown one also the third door up okay the shed with the dark door
24:00it's associated to this property so the guys are going to force open to the door
24:03and that's the shape of the dark door see the third door from the left that's her one
24:18oh good effort bags of a white crystalline powder appears to be a set of digital scales in there as
24:33well what have we got in here oh for flip's sake yeah some scales and other bags in there as well
24:39it was just sat on the right one side oh right i've not touched anything they'll look like vacuum seal
24:44bags oh yeah right so um i'll get some bags out yeah sure if we'll get all that seized
24:51yeah it changes things a bit yeah all broken coke bag ironica yeah
24:58pain aye there's quite a bit of stuff in there that's unbelievable it was literally just
25:04a bike seat unbelievable armed with this evidence duncan quickly makes a plan with his colleagues
25:11be free for a second so when the guys have gone to her shed and it's got a box of crack
25:17again in it scales so we're gonna have to take her to the station they're searched arrested on
25:23suspicion okay so what we're gonna do we're gonna take you to the police station okay for a further
25:31search in the upstairs flat ashley's team are taking stock of their own discoveries so this stuff
25:43all get seized i mean i don't know if anyone can identify any of this stuff as being theirs there's
25:49a bag containing benzocaine which is like a common mixing agent used for cocaine and stuff there's
25:57working set of scales from the same bedroom and there is a bag containing white powder confronted with
26:05this evidence the woman's anger turns from the police to the teenagers in the flat what is going on
26:12i am not impressed there's more going on here and nobody's telling me what is going on
26:18nobody's telling me there is a bigger story here okay
26:30to the west of inverness far out to sea lie the outer hebrides
26:35a chain of islands stretching for 130 miles along the edge of the atlantic capped at the north end by
26:45the largest island in scotland lewis and harris
26:55the hebrides are some of the last wilderness that we have in the uk we have phenomenal scenery great
27:08walks coastal routes cliffs we have amazing wildlife red stags birds of prey and atlantic salmon one of the
27:19iconic animals of scotland pc fraser edwards is lewis's wildlife crime liaison officer based in the island's
27:30capital stornoway
27:32today he's meeting a local gamekeeper who says he spotted poachers illegally fishing for salmon
27:42he saw people pull up in a boat and tie a net from a boy to the shoreline
27:48he's videoed this incident and he wants to bring it in to show me so i'm going to review it today
27:54and we'll see whether or not a crime has in fact taken place
28:01okay so the men in it talk me through it shaved head either late 50s early 60s
28:09i'd say maybe by foot 10. build stocky stocky yeah with a gray hoodie jumper
28:16it's uh it's a plastic boat just all green plastic pioneer boat okay could you identify the three
28:24men if you were to see them again yep happy days how'd you know the boys were out there we've been
28:32watching these buoys because they show up as soon as the salmon season starts running okay these
28:38buoys go out it's just trying to be at the right time right place and and nail them the video appears
28:44to show two boats laying nets between the shore and floating buoys out at sea it's hard to tell off
28:51of that video but how long is that net i'd say 100 feet known as gill nets they're designed to catch
28:59any fish swimming along the coast using them to catch atlantic salmon is illegal it's indiscriminate
29:07so when they're taking fish out of the water they could be females carrying their eggs and that's
29:14devastating for the population yeah oh there's a salmon there you see that video just what we needed
29:25the sporting estate paddy works for has a financial interest in catching the poachers
29:31it charges clients to fish for salmon legally with a rod and line while carefully managing the population
29:38because each salmon is caught and released multiple times a single fish can be worth up to 8 000 pounds
29:45to an estate this one's a distinctive enough net though blue floats yeah yeah i mean if we spot that
29:52net we can take it then thank you very much and once we id these guys we can get them charged so that'll be
30:00all right cheers cheers again fraser's confident that a crime has been committed but he doesn't know
30:10who's responsible on the hunt for more clues his next step is to head to the place the video was filmed
30:18a small crofting village south of stornoway here we go again
30:23while salmon are valuable to the estates and to lewis's economy fraser's just as concerned about the
30:33ecological impact of mass poaching people might think i'm only taking 15 20 30 fish over the course
30:42of a season but if multiple people are taking those kind of numbers and they're taking them almost all at
30:49once then that has a big effect on the population salmon are part of an ecological system that if they
30:57are to be removed from that the whole system will suffer the uk's wild salmon are now at risk of
31:05extinction but here in lewis not all islanders see poaching as a serious crime
31:11most people will have happy childhood memories of going out with their grandfathers or great grandfathers
31:23or fathers and setting nets for the salmon and so by a lot of people it's not actually seen as doing
31:31anything wrong because they have these happy memories of it
31:33on an island with 700 miles of rugged coastline and thousands of small boats
31:43fraser will have his work cut out to catch the poachers
31:52in inverness police have finished grading three flats linked to a liverpudlian county lines gang
31:59a county line is a mobile phone and that will be based in usually a big city in england the customer
32:08will contact the county line and the members of the group here in inverness will facilitate the sale of
32:13that drug ashley's team discovered suspicious white powder in the flat occupied by a woman and some
32:21youngsters now that her anger has subsided he explains what will happen next he's maybe reported for
32:29uh the drug supply but what do you mean by that it has to get tested first no no i get that i get that
32:34if that doesn't come back as anything there's obviously no inquiry that will happen if that
32:38does come back as a controlled drug there'll be an investigation taking place the white powder
32:43is an important find but not yet enough to arrest anyone from this flat there's not
32:49quantity wise not quite enough there for us to take them in and interview them just now we probably
32:54need some more evidence which is why we'll take things like mobile phones and other drug related
32:58equipment everything will have to get tested back at the office the officers pack up the evidence
33:05and prepare to return to base but as they're leaving they recognize one of the occupants of the empty flat
33:13that he's known to work for the county lines gang
33:26he has a knife in his pocket so he's immediately arrested
33:31but ashley's under no illusions that today's operation will smash the gang for good
33:36even though we we may take out some drugs and the workers for the group
33:45that county line that full number can still be used by the group and then with within a couple
33:50of days they can send more people up and then they can just start again
33:56in the past year drug supply offenses have increased by nearly 40 percent in the highlands
34:04and there are believed to be 10 county lines gangs operating in inverness
34:10while ashley continues to tackle them head on with raids and arrests some of his colleagues are
34:16trying a different approach so when i joined the police i never ever saw myself going into a crime
34:22prevention role but surely preventing people from becoming victims of crime is the core fundamentals of
34:30policing pc kevin taylor specializes in preventing crime before it happens he's on his way to another
34:39flat suspected of being used by a county lines gang but unlike ashley and duncan he's planning to knock
34:47it's not just a case of putting doors in and seizing drugs and then just leaving people we
34:52understand that people are being exploited and this gentleman in particular has been exploited
34:58the drug user he's about to meet is more victim than criminal he's an elderly male a sad back story
35:08to be honest he apparently didn't start taking drugs until he was in his 50s and now you know he finds
35:15himself being exploited by county lines groups we're just going down to to have a blether with him make sure
35:24he's okay targeting vulnerable people is a common county lines technique known as cuckooing
35:39the cuckoo bird will infiltrate another bird's nest and and use it to lay eggs
35:45and essentially that's what organized criminals do they'll come into the highlands
35:50they will identify a vulnerable person they'll exploit them and they'll take over their address
35:56and use it as a as a base to deal drugs from the door's badly damaged it's not secure
36:03next to that's been damaged in the past probably by the people that have been pushing their way into
36:08the address so at the minute he's got a makeshift locked on the other side and it's just really easy
36:12for people to come and go thanks thanks for letting us come in and have a chat we're still getting
36:19information through to us that people have been seen coming and going from the address whether that's
36:24local drug users whether that's organized criminals got another alarm here for you a personal attack
36:30alarm for you to use when you're out and about um this morning i was sleeping and the next thing the
36:39blankets were pulled over me and then whoever whoever was he he got frightened that there was somebody in
36:45in the house and he ran away it's concerning it's it's concerning for us to hear that to be honest
36:53well i did phone the police when there was a fight in here and somebody punched that wall behind you
37:01yeah yeah well i'm going to come back in a week or two to see the door's fixed because that door needs
37:08to be fixed as quickly as possible it's been damaged for too long now the information he gave us there
37:14was that's something we didn't know about you know the fact that he's lying in bed sleeping and somebody's
37:19walked in up to the bedroom pulled the covers from him and then got a fright when they saw him so you
37:25know did they think the house was going to be empty i don't know okay don't look good to see you again
37:30great good to see you again take care cheers this is something that when i was growing up didn't
37:36exist and it would be the local drug dealer that everyone everybody probably knew but nowadays we're
37:43seeing people coming into the area with different accents they've got knives machetes they're using
37:48violence threats of violence assaults serious assaults and unfortunately you know we've seen people
37:54getting killed because of this he could become the victim of a serious assault you know
38:01worst case scenario end up dead and that's not what we want
38:22over 90 miles away on lewis pc fraser edwards is hunting for three suspected salmon poachers who are
38:30caught on video there's a salmon there he's heading to the scene of the crime a small village five
38:37miles south of the island's capital stornoway i grew up with a great interest in wildlife
38:44my grandfather he was very keen from a young age to get us interested in wildlife and lots of trips to
38:49edinburgh zoo and it gave me an appreciation for animals that sometimes people don't have
38:54fraser's concerned he may face opposition from islanders who believe salmon fishing shouldn't be
39:01against the law once you get outside of stornoway you get into some of these little villages you're
39:07talking 100 200 300 people and they'll know each other and they will look out for each other as
39:12communities do i think if you can be a cop you need a pretty thick skin although the boats used by the
39:20poachers are identifiable in the video finding them on this rugged coastline is no easy matter
39:28fraser investigates every inlet and as he's driving past a small bay something catches his eye that's
39:35one of the boats there it looks like the green boat in the video fraser wants to seize it as evidence
39:44but to do so he'll need extra hands and another boat to tour to shore he calls paddy the gamekeeper
39:50who originally reported the poaching so what it is i'm out in ranish now and i've found the boat
39:56i don't know if i'd be able to drag it without doing quite a bit of damage if yourselves were
40:04able to come out on the rib and then take it to a slip where we could get someone to come and recover
40:13but the politics of salmon poaching are starting to create problems for fraser
40:19the sporting estate paddy works for is unwilling to lend fraser its boat for fear of upsetting locals
40:26i know dude hey we are where we are that's fine all right thanks very much for all your help anyway
40:31i really just don't want to lose any kind of i don't want to lose these boats
40:40if one of your boys is still okay to come down and we'll just pull this thing in and i can get
40:45photos of it and and like you know serial number off the outboard motor all that kind of stuff
40:50although the estate won't help fraser sees the boat he eventually gets help to board it
41:00there we go okay
41:10okay that's fine yeah yeah that one's fine fraser's now certain that this is the green
41:16boat in the video right okay cool but as he's examining it he's interrupted by an unexpected
41:21arrival hi there no it's all right we're just leaving okay thank you yeah what's going on here
41:29can i explain it to you when i get off of this is that all right that's okay that's great cheers
41:35yeah i get that i'll have a word with you when i go
41:38oh absolutely yeah yeah this is head of order thank you okay all right well i'll have a wee chat
41:43with you when we're not standing on the edge of the rocks first
41:49i am in this instance yes sir i'll explain it to you after when we get the outside okay
41:55all right okay good good all right sir okay so what it is that right i caution you you're not
42:02obliged to say anything but you do say we'll be noting maybe using evidence you understand
42:05yeah certainly yeah they are under caution all right what it is is that i have reason to believe
42:11that that boat was used in a poaching incident right okay poaching for salmon okay so i don't have
42:20to discuss what proof i have with you right okay but if i if at some point you are to be charged with
42:24the offense then everything that i do have would be made available to you okay under the fisher
42:30what uh for i know the rules i know the law good okay all right i have reason to suspect that you've
42:35been poaching okay and so that's what has given me the right just now to be able to go onto your
42:39boat and to search it yeah and to take and you didn't find anything anything no i didn't find it
42:43no you didn't because i wasn't poaching okay all right and i'm really i'm a fisherman it's my work
42:47yeah this is what i'm doing all right sir and i'm going to be out every day fishing okay
42:51and i can't have this i'll ask me this is out of order for sir because i was out on the boat when some
42:55guys were out with an edge that's what happened mate i was there all right right i was talking to them okay
43:00and this they're obviously thinking that i'm coaching because i was talking to guys who are
43:03at the net all right i think when you're dealing with people who are animated or excited um or
43:08upset for what you're trying to show that you are somebody who is there doing a job and that they
43:14need to treat you with respect i'm a fisherman i'm trying to make my bloody living and whatever for
43:19some reason whoever just say that i'm poaching stop saying let me all right i'm not swearing at you
43:23okay well i understand right okay and what i'm saying is that i appreciate that you're annoyed but i need
43:28you to be calm here okay yeah right that's easy for you to see see if you haven't done anything wrong
43:33then fine okay but i have to investigate it that's my job all right all right okay
43:41so what he said there under caution without being asked i add is that he was out there
43:47he did see the gentleman that had the net and that he pulled up and he was talking to them however
43:52the evidence that we've got suggests that he was actually laying in it himself and that he was
43:57sitting there waiting up with the other two men for an extended period of time he certainly would
44:03have been a lot more upset if we just motored off on his boat but there you go
44:10before he can charge the fisherman fraser needs to corroborate the evidence in the video
44:15back at the station he interviews a second gamekeeper who also witnessed the poaching
44:24we stopped in to really close and we were watching them right at the end when they were pulling it in
44:30they got a salmon in the net yeah and they took the salmon away with them and then it okay
44:38it corroborates what was given to us in the statement and also matches what took place in the
44:44videos that we've seen as well so it's good we now have enough to charge the gentleman in the boat
44:52hello hello fraser asked the suspect to come in for an interview
44:59yeah just come straight to the station
45:03if you've got one you know that's willing to come with you then by all means
45:07fraser's now close to charging one of the suspected poachers but the two fishermen in the other boat
45:13remain unidentified
45:30in inverness ashley and duncan have returned from the drugs raid
45:34now they need to start building a case against the county lines gang
45:43point five
45:46first they have to confirm exactly what they have seized
45:54so the liquid has turned red which would indicate to as a positive result for cannabis
45:59duncan tests the white powder found in the shed so here we have what we suspect to be powder cocaine
46:06which is more expensive than crack cocaine um it's in a vacuum sealed bag
46:12which is quite interesting it's not what we were expecting so i'm going to test one sample
46:16if the powder is cocaine it will turn the liquid blue
46:22instant indicate positive result for cocaine
46:28five ten years ago people would be
46:32solely using heroin but over the past couple of years the trend has been people are moving
46:38more towards crack cocaine simply because it is more addictive
46:42what i've done is i've just weighed the items in the packaging just for the gross weight
46:48i want to keep the packaging on because i don't want to touch it too much because i'll go for
46:52dna testing at this point that's what we can roughly gauge us about 30 grams of cocoon
46:5830 grams of powder cocaine has a street value of over 2 000 pounds
47:05also in the coca-cola freezer bag was a big bundle of similar green clear bags as we found the
47:13cocaine in and there was also a set of scales within the coca-cola bag and now that we've tested
47:21the coke we can see that it is the real thing meanwhile ashley sorts through the items seized from
47:29the upstairs flat so this is a pouch of what's called benzocaine this is a really well-known
47:36cutting mixture and what people do is they will we mix the cocaine and the benzocaine together
47:42and that then helps dilute the cocaine and enables them to sell more and get more money
47:48the other things from within the house as you can see we have a mobile phone
47:53which interestingly since we've returned to the station has been reset remotely there's been
47:58obviously something on that phone they don't want us to see working scales and an amount of cash
48:05i mean there's hundreds and hundreds of pounds there all these things we're all in the same room
48:10together or so yeah indicates to us that whoever this belongs to is um supplying drugs from within
48:18that address really happy with the results even though you know we've got maybe not as much as
48:26we would have hoped for we're still able to use our tactics in order to disrupt and and and deter them
48:32as much as possible if we can disrupt groups enough that they don't feel comfortable sitting in a house
48:44for more than a few hours then that's a win for us because they then have to think of a new way
48:50to continue what they're doing
48:57you have 15 16 year old people addicted to heroin and crack cocaine in inverness the problem has to
49:06be addressed before that stage we have to find a way of stopping it from reaching in places like
49:13inverness that's that's what we need to to achieve and until we do that we will always have this problem
49:21it's not going away
49:33on lewis fraser edwards hunt for salmon poachers has entered its second day
49:47he's heading back to the scene of the crime with a colleague pc callum mcdonald and updating him
49:53on the investigation so far yesterday afternoon i called the owner of the green boat
50:00yeah and asked him to come into the station for an interview
50:06initially gave me a bunch of information that we knew to be false due to the witness accounts and
50:12the videos and when i put that to him he then began to change his story and so i charged him
50:18with the poaching offense
50:22with one suspected poacher accounted for fraser still needs to find the men who are filmed laying the nets
50:30so the chap we're heading to see just now what's his involvement in the in the poaching last night
50:38i got an anonymous tip that the guy who owns the white bolt lives at an address in ranish um so we're
50:47going to head to that address now and if he is there and he's he is the only indeed the owner of the boat
50:52then i'd want to carry out a search of the boat photograph the serial numbers things like that
50:58and then look to arrest him and take him in for an interview and what was his actual involvement
51:04was he casting the net in the footage there's two in this particular boat i don't know which one
51:10is the owner so i don't know which one we would be looking to see this is very scant information
51:15so you could call it a fishing trip then when they reach the address fraser and callum scour the
51:28bay for the second boat it's the one we're looking for white with a red underbelly and it's got a very
51:34like painted dark brown interior looking out into here have we got any wee boats smeared up no
51:43they don't look red no that one's blue
51:53the white boat isn't here so the cops decide to head to the area where the poaching was reported
51:59jack it's on although they have footage from the gamekeeper the police hope to find more clues at
52:08the scene of the crime latest figures show that in 2022-23 only seven people were prosecuted for
52:16fish poaching and if this case does make it to court every scrap of evidence will count wildlife
52:23crimes can get bogged down a lot of the legislation is very old and it can be difficult to explain the
52:31full circumstances of the case before a court so we always try and put forward as much evidence as
52:38we can possibly get sorry we've got a bit of an audience now yeah i know
52:45but the coastline of lewis is hilly and rocky and riven with inlets and bays
52:51finding the spot where the poachers tied up their nets will not be easy
52:58i struggle to see how poaching any fish is worth this
53:02well they're coming out in the boat so see he's not coming that far the coastline is dotted with ropes
53:08evidence of a thriving poaching culture
53:12poaching here has been like a family tradition you know people in the community would you know used to
53:18write their names for their address on the nets and you know they would phone each other if a
53:22neighbor's net had fish in it with no names and addresses on these ropes they consult the poaching
53:29footage again if we look at that's where we are all right so it is it's at that outcrop there oh look yeah you can see the rope
53:39so it's that boy and it's to that rope that's over there
53:42so that's what we want to take okay
53:48right to follow my ass here
53:52you're doing a grand job aha yeah thanks mate
53:56the rope the rope is blue with a distinctive green line matching the one seen in the footage
54:04it's another vital clue
54:10i'm happy that we found the locusts all this helps to paint the picture of what happened
54:20but their search isn't over yet
54:28there is fraser spots the final piece of the puzzle the second boat used by the suspected poachers
54:41fraser now has all the evidence he needs but to close the investigation he needs to confront the
54:48owner of the boat as dusk falls he approaches the suspected poachers house
54:57hello sir what is that is the incident at ranish common grazing i heard something there's video
55:05evidence of it um and we have the statements from people who saw you um out there with the boat
55:12putting out the net taking the net back in there was a salmon in the net when it was brought back in
55:16so what i'll do just now is i will charge you um with the offense um which is fish for or take salmon
55:24other than by rod and line or net and cobble namely by uh gill net do you understand the charge sir
55:31i do yeah okay have you anything that you'd like to say in reply no okay thank you very much
55:43after two days of investigation fraser has managed to charge two of the three men
55:50but if he is to protect the salmon he needs to win over the rest of the island's community
55:55i think what's telling about this entire incident is that of the two men that we have charged neither
56:03of them has any previous convictions or has previously been charged with any poaching that
56:09probably tells its own story of how difficult it is to gather enough evidence to be able to charge
56:17poachers in an area like this which is so vast with so little resources and with a community
56:25that for a large part don't see poaching salmon as a bad thing
56:39so
57:09This is a puncture repair kit with a wee note on it from the gentleman that ran away from
57:25us. After he got released from hospital he came back to Fort William and picked up his
57:31car and obviously on his way back he's decided to leave a wee present of a puncture repair
57:35kit for the car. I told him about the puncture on the car just to fill the gap and he's remembered.
57:43On the front it says Highland Cop Stephen and then PTO. To Stephen, for the Ranger, just
57:51in case. Massive thank you. Albeit it's a bicycle tyre puncture repair kit, he's given us a puncture
57:57repair kit.
58:00Last time, police uncover an extensive and suspicious collection of chemicals in a flat
58:07in Inverness.
58:08I'll send you images of it just now but we're really not having it.
58:12Wildlife police investigate an attack on a protected bird.
58:15Exactly what we suspected. It's absolutely related to a shotgun pallet.
58:21St Glencoe police launch a major search for two missing hill walkers.
58:28What the other day is the
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