If you notice something linked to the railways, you can report concerns to the British Transport Police by texting 61016 from your mobile. If you would rather remain anonymous, you can contact the independent charity Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111. You can speak to your local police by dialling 101, or in an emergency 999. Even if someone isn't involved in county lines drug dealing, they may be being exploited in some other way, so it's always worth speaking out. The best advice is to trust your instincts. An increase in anti-social behaviour in the community.Truancy, exclusion, disengagement from school.Young people seeming unfamiliar with your community or where they are.Young people seen in different cars/taxis driven by unknown adults.
Residents or young people you know going missing, maybe for long periods of time.Unexplained, sometimes unaffordable new things (e.g clothes, jewellery, cars etc).Changes in the way young people you might know dress.Substance misuse and/or drug paraphernalia.secretive/ withdrawn/ aggressive/ emotional) Change in resident's mood and/or demeanour (e.g.New and regularly changing residents (e.g different accents compared to local accent.New faces appearing at the house or flat.An increase in visitors and cars to a house or flat.How do you know if County Lines drug dealing is happening in your area?
So it's important that we all play our part to understand county lines and speak out if we have concerns. People exploited in this way will quite often be exposed to physical, mental and sexual abuse, and in some instances will be trafficked to areas a long way from home as part of the network's drug dealing business.Īs we have seen in child sexual exploitation, children often don't see themselves as victims or realise they have been groomed to get involved in criminality. In some cases the dealers will take over a local property, normally belonging to a vulnerable person, and use it to operate their criminal activity from. The dealers will frequently target children and adults - often with mental health or addiction problems - to act as drug runners or move cash so they can stay under the radar of law enforcement.
Exploitation of young and vulnerable peopleĪ common feature in county lines drug supply is the exploitation of young and vulnerable people. They are likely to exploit children and vulnerable adults to move the drugs and money and they will often use coercion, intimidation, violence (including sexual violence) and weapons. The 2018 Home Office Serious Crime Strategy states the NPCC definition of a County Line is a term used to describe gangs and organised criminal networks involved in exporting illegal drugs into one or more importing areas, using dedicated mobile phone lines or other form of “deal line”.
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