There are "worrying" signs that more women are committing violent offences, Scotland's top law officer told MSPs today.

Lord Advocate Elish Angiolini said that while most offences carried out by females were "acquisitive" crimes such as theft or fraud, she added more women were using aggressive behaviour.

And she suggested that could be connected to increasing levels of binge drinking among young women.

Giving evidence to Holyrood's Equal Opportunities Committee, Ms Angiolini said: "There is evidence that while most of the crime committed by women is acquisitive, there are those committing violent offences.

"I've seen anecdotal evidence and from my own experience as a prosecutor over 25 years or so, that many women are not just simply the collaborators, going along with a dominant male partner, being an accessory, carrying knifes for boyfriends, assisting in cleaning up after a murder, hiding weapons etc - but are actually prime movers in some of the cases."

She continued: "We have seen some appalling acts of torture by women against women, we have seen increasing signs of groups of young girls using knives, against predominantly other young girls, and carrying weapons.

"And those are what we might traditionally have perceived as male behaviours."

Ms Angiolini said: "The violence seems in some way to be aligned with the increasing consumption of alcohol by young women, binge drinking.

"And in the drugs world there are a very small number who are leading groups and gangs in drugs."

And while the Lord Advocate accepted many of the women who ended up in prison had problems such as mental illnesses, she added: "It's not simply the case that all women are there because of their vulnerability as such.

"There are some signs, which I find worrying, of women adopting aggressive behaviours, which hitherto hadn't been common."

But she added that compared to the number of men who committed such offences, the number of women doing so was a "very small number".