Drugs unit gardai are redeployed

ALL MEMBERS of the ‘garda drugs unit’ in County Wicklow will be re-assigned to uniform effective from Monday, December 4.

Superintendent Pat Ward of Bray Garda Station said that the unit is not being disbanded but rather undergoing a change of personnel.

He said that it is, in fact, called the Crime Prevention Unit. Supt Ward said that the new set of personnel will be allocated to the unit early in the new year and that, in the meantime, the detective branch will fulfil that function.

He said that more detectives have been appointed to that branch across the county.

‘ The time of the personnel has come to an end in that unit. It was always a finite period of time,’ said Supt Ward.

He said that the purpose of that is to allow other gardaí the opportunity to apply to work in that area in their careers. ‘People are not in that unit forever,’ he said, adding that they have the opportunity to re-apply to enter the unit.

‘It is the responsibility of every member of An Garda Síochana to enforce drugs legislation,’ said Supt Ward. ‘ The Crime Prevention Unit would have a particular focus on the enforcement of drugs legislation,’ he said.

Meanwhile, the traffic unit is to increase in numbers and have a new base in Newtownmountkennedy.

The divisional unit is currently based in both Bray and Wicklow. Superintendent Ward said that this change will also be introduced early in the new year.

He said that there will also be extra patrols in the lead-up to Christmas, focusing in part on the possibility that motorists could be driving over the legal alcohol limit the morning after consuming alcohol.