A Dundee police chief has defended the emergency response to riots in Kirkton on Halloween after allegations they were unprepared to handle the events.
Huge groups set fires across roads, lobbed fireworks and smashed windows at St Paul’s RC Academy on Monday night.
A helicopter and police in riot gear were called in to deal with the disorder – with one officer injured.
It happened while families with young children were walking in the area guising.
On Tuesday, Chief Superintendent Phil Davison appeared in Kirkton to speak to The Courier reporter James Simpson and other members of the media.
He called the behaviour “absolutely deplorable”, “reckless” and said it put emergency service workers at risk.
But he also defended the police’s reaction to the disorder, after several locals claimed officers did not attend serious incidents on Balgowan Avenue and Beauly Avenue and said they only stepped in when the chaos approached the school.
Ch Supt Davison said: “I condemn that behaviour and can assure a large scale investigation is now ongoing to identify those responsible.
“In terms of the policing response, there were officers drafted in from other areas of Police Scotland, specialist officers in nature to help support the response to what was a spontaneous incident and to quell the disturbance that was seen.
“We continue to work with a range of partners across Dundee and are engaging with the local community as we progress our investigation, in order to ensure that all preventative approaches can be taken to stop any future behaviour of this kind taking place.”
Majority of group were aged ’12 to late teens’
He added that no arrests have yet been made but the group responsible is aged between “12 to late teens”.
This is the Q&A with Ch Supt Davison in full.
Q:Â How can you explain the police handling of Monday’s incident?
A: “Dealing with any incident of mass disorder is always extremely challenging, so there was a significant police presence deployed to the area on Monday.
“We need to be balanced and measured in terms of how and when we step in with tactics to quell and disperse the disorder that we’ve seen.
“That’s on the basis of sometimes going in too early can then antagonise further behaviour and make the situation worse.
“We fall back on experienced commanders that are used to dealing with situations of this nature to ensure the tactics and response provided by policing is appropriate.
“We brought the incident to a conclusion in as quick a time frame as possible.
“There was a fast policing response in terms of the support and additional officers drawn in.”
Q : Given past anti-social behaviour issues in Kirkton, and warnings in The Courier a year ago, why was there not a greater visible police presence on the ground?
A : “So there was an enhanced police presence put in place for this time of year from Halloween through to Bonfire Night.
“That enhanced police presence was seen as proportionate, in terms of the information and expectations for policing that we would have at this time of year.
“We did not have any information that we were going to see disorder on this scale.”
Q: Why did emergency services congregate at St Paul’s RC Academy?
A: “The incidents we saw on Monday were fast moving, ultimately when officers first deploy at a scene they look to gather together at a point to enable wider deployment.
“We then look to clearly deploy officers to the areas of most risk.
“If there have been points where it appeared there were officers in certain areas over others it’s in response to a threat or risk we’re facing.”
Q: Have any arrests been made?
A: “We haven’t arrested anybody at this stage.
“We do have a number of positive lines of inquiry as you would expect from the volume of video captures, CCTV footage and contacts from members of the public.
“The majority of the group were in the age range of 12 to late teens.”
Q: Do you have a message for parents or carers of those involved?Â
A: “Our children need to take a little bit of personal responsibility in terms of the behaviour we saw.
“Their actions were dangerous, reckless and could have seen serious injuries occur to some people.
“To parents and guardians, I would encourage them to have conversations with their children about what is acceptable behaviour and the dangers involved with fireworks, throwing objects and becoming involved in large group situations.
“To have an understanding about where children are and what they’re involved in.”
Q: What do you know about the motivation behind what happened?
A: “I won’t speculate the specifics at this stage.
“I think it’s appropriate we complete a full investigation to understand exactly how and why the disorder started last night.
“What I can say is that it was spontaneous in its nature in terms of the size and the scale of the gathering.”
Q: What will police and other authorities do to ensure there is no repeat on Bonfire Night?
A: “We will be looking at an enhanced policing presence over the course of the coming days.
“I can fully appreciate and understand the distress that has been caused to local residents.
“The actions as I’ve said were deplorable and nobody should be in their house or their local community seeing the sort of behaviour present on Monday.
“The message to the locals residents is one of reassurance, that policing had a significant response to quell the disturbances.
“We will have hi-visibility and local engagement in our communities and we will have an enhance policing presence in the coming days.”
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