Police have charged more than 200 people with almost 180 offences across the Sunshine Coast since a high-visibility policing operation began in March last year.
Operation Whiskey Unison focuses on preventing, disrupting and investigating youth crime through community engagement and patrols at intelligence-driven hotspot locations.
In the past 12 months statewide, the operation has resulted in 11,023 people being arrested on 17,791 charges, including drug, weapons, traffic, property crime and bail offences.
Of the people arrested, 4149 of them were juveniles, who are facing 7551 charges.
On the Sunshine Coast, police charged 203 people with about 179 offences.
There have been 5647 proactive measures in the Sunshine Coast district and 160,406 proactive activities completed by police and police liaison officers (PLOs) across the state, including hotspot patrols, shopping centre and business walkthroughs, bail compliance checks, community engagements and service station drop-ins.
Youth crime acting assistant commissioner Andrew Massingham said having extra boots on the ground had been integral to supporting officers across the state over the past 12 months.
“Our officers work tirelessly to deter youth crime and we are taking steps in the right direction, but we know this is just the beginning of what will be a long road of persistent efforts,” he said.
“Everyone from our police liaison officers who engage our multicultural and First Nations communities, to general duties patrolling shopping centres and known crime hotspots, and our district crime prevention teams working hard to assist victims of crime – our frontline does a wonderful job and the result we’ve seen from Whiskey Unison is testament to this.
“We know high visibility is an important deterrent and it all counts towards ensuring the community feels safe.”
The boots-on-the-ground style of operation also allows more opportunities for officers and PLOs to conduct bail checks and engage with young people.
Patrols largely involve a dedicated police presence using marked vehicles, mobile police beats and foot patrols in known hotspot areas, with mounted unit and highway patrol also utilised.
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