Ex-Tayside police officer Vince Smith

Former Tayside police officer Vince Smith has died.

Mr Smith, of Blairgowrie, was born in Dundee in 1943, the eldest, and only boy, of a family of four.

He attended school in Kinnettles and Newtyle as by then the family had moved to Jericho, outside Forfar.

Mr Smith began an apprenticeship as a mechanic with AM Phillips but this gave way to what would be his lifelong career as he joined the police service in 1969.

He went on to serve in various places including Blairgowrie, Dunkeld and Perth until he retired from the force in 2000.

Latterly he was involved in community policing – a post he took on for 13 months and stayed for 13 years.

He was one of the pioneers of this type of policing and it used Mr Smith’s skill of speaking to people.

He toured schools and housing schemes on his bike and in this role Mr Smith was very involved in helping the people of North Muirton when flooding hit in 1993.

Mr Smith had his own way of doing things and a former colleague described him as a “supervisor’s nightmare”.

He was well known for the huge amount of charity work he did, raising money for Braveheart, CHAS and for a scanner at PRI among other good causes.

This work was recognised by a citizen of the year award and then in 1998 by the presentation of an MBE for services to the community and to charity.

It was at a dance in Wellbank that Mr Smith met Anne.

They were married in 1965 and went on to celebrate their golden wedding in 2015.

He is survived by his wife, sons Robert and Steven, daughters-in-law Gillian and Jill and five grandchildren.

Vince Smith devoted a lot of his time to charity work.