Repeat meth users costing police time

People suffering from drug-induced psychosis are diverting police resources from other jobs as officers spend hours every week at Bunbury Hospital.

Officers from Australind are being called to respond to people requiring a police escort to hospital after taking drugs, particularly methamphetamine, numerous times each week.

Australind Police officer-in-charge acting Sen. Sgt Chris Clelland said officers at the station had noticed an increase in the use of methamphetamine over the past year.

He said although the problem was increasing there was not hundreds of methamphetamine users in the area.

“Police get called when people are experiencing side effects,” acting Sen. Sgt Clelland said.

“It’s a handful of people over and over again.”

The problem faced by police was that when they were called there were often no charges they could lay because any evidence of drug use has been removed.

Acting Sen. Sgt Clelland said often it was the families and friends who called police or the ambulance when a loved one was suffering from drug-induced side effects.

When officers from Australind were required to escort a violent patient to hospital it often took two officers away from the station for up to three hours.

“Over the past two or three months we’ve seen an increase,” Acting Sen. Sgt Clelland said.

South West police have seized 20 per cent more drugs this year than last, but South West District Supt. Peter Hatch said that did not equate to an equal increase in drug manufacturing or dealing in the area. Included in that amount was 0.5kg of methamphetamine.

He said the rise in seizures could be put down to a big effort by police to trace and prosecute dealers.

Increased methamphetamine use is often associated with a rise in violent crimes but Supt. Hatch said this trend had not been evident in the region.

“I look at what we’re attending to and do I see an increase in bad assaults? Not really,” he said.

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