Police seized more than 850kg of the most serious drugs from dealers in Scotland last year, figures show.
Herbal cannabis and cannabis resin made up more than half of the bulk (669kg), followed by 120kgs of cocaine and 54kgs of heroin.
Government statistics for 2016-17 show that Police Scotland seized more than 18,000 cannabis plants, approximately 8,600 ecstasy-type tablets and 2.2 million Class C drugs such as diazepam.
The quantity of Class A and B drugs seized was down from more than 1.2 tonnes in 2015-16 but the number of individual seizures of cocaine, ecstasy, heroin and cannabis increased from 3,376 to 3,399 between the years.
The National Statistics publication said: "The quantity of drugs seized can fluctuate considerably each year and does not necessarily move in line with the number of seizures made.
"Whilst most drug seizures consist of relatively small quantities (usually possession-related crimes), annual quantities of drugs seized can be greatly influenced by a small number of large seizures (usually from supply-related crimes)."
Analysis of records between 2014 and 2017 found that 49% of drug seizures took place in the street, with 28% in a house or garden.
Drug seizures are more common over the weekend, with Fridays and
Saturdays accounting for 20% and 19% over the last three years.
The vast majority (86%) of offenders were male with the average age of 29.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel