Evening Telegraph (First Edition)
Intruder pics of drug probe pool
PICTURES from inside Forfar’s old swimming pool, at the centre of a police probe, have been posted online by selfstyled urban explorers.
Several images, which cannot be published for legal reasons, appear to show material relating to the discovery of a cannabis farm there last year.
The photographs were published on the Abandoned/Urbex Scotland Facebook page at the weekend.
More than 20 images show parts of the interior of the old baths at The Vennel, which have been boarded up since closing in 2017.
They include views of the main pool hall and changing rooms.
Abandoned/Urbex Scotland has two Facebook pages, including one private group with more than 10,000 followers.
And its Forfar posts have been shared more than 170 times, attracting nearly 200 comments.
In August police raided the building in connection with the discovery of a cannabis farm there and three men later appeared in private at Forfar Sheriff Court.
All faced a single charge of contravening the Misuse of Drugs Act 1971.
None of the men – aged 64, 38 and 20 – made any plea and all were remanded in custody.
Abandoned/Urbex Scotland has been contacted for comment.
The group’s social media posts suggest the Forfar photographs were taken recently.
They wrote: “Disclaimer: This place had long been seen to by police. This is how it was left!”
Their Facebook profile says: “This group is for people to share pictures of abandoned buildings and places in Scotland.” But they add: “Please don’t post locations. We want to preserve these places and preserve history.
“If anyone posts locations you will be removed from the group and banned.”
The old pool lay empty after being replaced by a new facility at Forfar Community Campus. It was eventually sold for £57,000 to Edinburgh-based Developments North Country Ltd.
Attempts to contact the firm have been unsuccessful.
In February, police and Angus Council were contacted by locals after water was seen pouring from the building.
Scottish Water later confirmed it had closed the valve supplying water to the property.
The council said it would be contacting the owner.“Empty buildings, while a security risk for the owners, do not automatically constitute dangerous buildings,” the council said at the time.
“Building owners are responsible for preventing their buildings falling into a dangerous condition.
“The powers given to local authorities by the Building (Scotland) Act 2003 do not diminish this responsibility but are merely a ‘safety net’ that must be used to protect the public when it appears to a local authority that, for whatever reason, a building owner has failed in their duty.”