Overall searches carried out by Gardaí in Tipperary have declined this year.
This data covers the year up to October and shows a decline of 36% within the entire Division.
One of the metrics that Gardaí use when looking at tackling crime in the county is ‘Proactive Policing Measures.’
This looks at the number of searches that members conducted in the pursuit of finding criminal activity.
The decrease seen this year was across the board in terms of offences;
Searches for possession of firearms saw a 66% decrease from 3 to 1, while possession of offensive weapons decreased from 62 to 45, equating to a 27 % drop.
When it comes to drugs there was also a drop in search numbers.
Last year there were 464 searches pertaining to possession of drugs for personal use, however, this year there were only 280 to date.
Meanwhile, possession of drugs for sale or supply saw searches in the county drop by 7% from 97 to 90.
The reason behind the drop has been put down to the issues with Garda numbers limiting the resources available locally to carry out the same level of searches this year.
