RAPE NUMBERS SUPPRESSED BY POLICE RECORDING PROCESS

Yet another example of how crime statistics are distorted for immoral purposes is highlighted in a report from the BBC.

The article states that the BBC have learned that rape claims are being left off official crime records. A freedom of information request has revealed that some UK police forces fail to record more than 40% of cases.

Police rules of guidance for rape state that only allegations verified as false, reported to the wrong force, or recorded in error can be removed.

Wide regional variations are reflected but some forces had such a high number of cases removed from records - known as "no-criming" - that critics say it is evident the rules are not being properly applied.

The article goes on to reveal that there are hundreds of instances where rapes are reported but never make it into the Home Office figures. This doesn't even take into account incidents that were reported and subsequently "no-crimed".

This is a further, more serious example of  example of how police procedures and the ridiculous race for detections and performance targeting obstruct the frontline officer from fulfilling their function as effectively as they would want, with the knock on effect of frustrating the ends of justice for the true victims.

False Allegations

There are instances where false allegations are made for whatever reason. A relationship goes wrong and the woman regrets having sex with a man and makes the allegation, after a few drinks a woman has sex with a man then fearing the consequences of discovery by her partner, reports the matter as rape to cover her tracks. The police have an extremely difficult task in getting to the truth of these allegations but there are skilled and trusted officers who are eminently capable of doing so. Rape is one allegation that is said to be "difficult to prove and even more difficult to disprove", so a great degree of care, sensitvity and diligence is required to arrive at the facts.

Of the rape cases that are reported, a meagre 6.5% are detected. Home Office and police information suggests that only 2% of cases are found to be false. If offences are being concealed or suppressed in this way, it disguises the enormity and sevirity of the real problem.

RAPE IS TRIVIALISED

The issue that is of great concern here is that the police crime reporting process is used as yet another means to suppress the real undetected crime picture in the UK. Any commitment and endeavour of the investigating officers is tainted by the subsequent failure to record the offence accurately when the offence is misrepresented or simply not recorded.

The police guidelines for recording crime centre around "Victim Focus". If a crime is reported, the victim has grounds to believe a crime has occurred and there is no quality evidence to suggest otherwise, the police are required to record the matter as a crime. This applies regardless of the offence, burglary, theft, wounding, fraud or sexual offences including rape. If someone breaks into your house and steals your property, it is reported as a burglary. That crime stands on the books whether the offender is caught and a detection is achieved or not. If the suspect is arrested, charged and for whatever reason a conviction is not achieved, the crime of burglary remains as a recorded crime. How can it be then, that if a woman is raped, and there is no quality evidence to suggest it is a false allegation, that the incident can be so easily wiped off the books?

There is something seriously wrong with the moral compass of the policy of a force that encourages or permits this to happen.

POLICE ATTITUDES

It is easy to make the mistake of generalising police attitudes. The cases that attract the media attention are those where officers displayed  a less than sympathetic or even dismissive attitude toward the victim. One of the best writers on this subject is a police blogger, writing under a pseudonym of WPC Ellie Bloggs. Read some of her articles on the subject by clicking here. "Ellie" is both a woman and a serving police officer, with a balanced view of the problem and her views make for informed reading on the subject.

The distortion of the recording of rape crimes is a despicable use of the process for statistical benefit and needs revision urgently. As we have seen in other articles from these pages, rape is not the only crime that is misreported or mis-allocated for the sole purpose of projecting a better image of policing and detections. It is however, one of the examples with far more serious implications and consequences to justice being delivered and restoring public confidence.

Far better that a crime is reported, whatever its category, and the public are made aware of the real resource needs of the police service to deal with the problem, than using statistics as a political football so that the latest crime reduction headlines can be so blithly reported. Once the true picture is revealed, the correct degree of resource and expertise can be applied to deal with it. Until that time, the UK public will continue to be short changed and conned, both in terms of the millions paid in tax and the justice it deserves.

GORDON BROWN ... LET THE POLICE GET BACK TO BASICS

Posted as a reply to a post on Inspector Gadgets site

http://inspectorgadget.wordpress.com/2009/09/15/the-single-measure-of-public-confidence/

Drastic measures need to be introduced so that coppers can “get back to basics” and do the job they really want to do, lock up villains and protect the public.

All the flow chart based strategies and “flavour of the month” schemes may keep the SMT (Senior Management Teams) and they who must be obeyed at the Home Office behind their nice little desks, but they are a major distraction to the basics of what police officers join the job to do and what the public expects.

None of the blame for this state of our society lies at the door of the front line copper, who can only do their best with the tools they are given. The problem lies in the “empire building” culture from above. Politicians are the worlds worst for it and their influence is obvious as it cascades down the SMT ranks.

It’s the front line troops who end up having to face all the crap that these ideas and strategies create.

The challenge is dismantling the bureaucratic politically driven machine. If the front liners are not included in the process, the likely outcome will be an even greater more complex bureacratic machine to manage away the bureaucracy it was intended to eliminate! Let’s hope Jan Berry is possessed with enough common sense principles to stop the rot.

She has a mountain to climb in that she has the problems to solve quickly, and an interfering headline seeking Government to impede her progress.

In business, if a company takes its eye off the basics, it goes bump. Sooner or later, it is forced to address what distracts them from the core activity of generating cash and profit.

In a similar vein regarding police activity, the common thread seems to be to eliminate all distractions that keep officers away from what they do best and joined to do, to be out there on the street doing the basics. The rest is just distracting peripheral crap that adds liitle or no value.

The public don’t want to hear phoney headlines drawn from surveys, they want coppers out there, as much as possible, preventing crime and making their patch a safer place to be.

A certain amount of admin is necessary, but the duplicated effort, the pointless collection of unecessary data “just in case”, the time wasted on schemes and initiatives, and the excessive allocation of resources to non operational policing, seem to be a major distraction.

Public support will return slowly, when someone at a high level recognises the urgency of getting back to basics, stops the talking and planning, and makes it bloody well happen. When the public sees better responses, with the elimination of al the crap that gets in the way of justice being served AND seen to be served, there will be little or no need for further initiatives, surveys and the rest of the mintutae that is killing the job.

Off topic but all credit to Paul McGeever at the Federation for his letter to Gordon Brown yesterday about the Yvonne Fletcher/ Libyan trade deal debaucle. We posted support and a copy of his letter on this site where you can also see his letter to GB.

http://thinbluelineuk.blogspot.com/2009/09/police-federation-letter-to-gordon.html

Crime Analyst Team
Nice 1 Limited

POLICE FEDERATION LETTER TO GORDON BROWN RE MURDER OF WPC YVONNE FLETCHER

http://www.polfed.org/Letter_to_Rt_Hon_Gordon_Brown_RE_Yvonne_Fletcher_150909.pdf

The team at Nice 1 Ltd, would like to take this opportunity to endorse the sentiments contained in the letter by Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation, addressed to Prime Minister, Gordon Brown.

The letter details the Federation dismay and disgust at the recent disclosure of the Government deal that traded justice for the murder of WPC Yvonne Fletcher in return for commercial gain.

To see the letter in full click here or the link pasted above.

Never mind the question of public faith and confidence in its police service, only a complete reversal of this decision would go some way to restoring any remnants of confidence in Mr Brown at this stage.

Crime Analysis Team
Nice 1 Limited

GORDON BROWN SHUNS BEREAVED VICTIMS FAMILIES

It seems somewhat of a contradiction that the Government plough so much funding into committees to encourage a "Victim Focused" strategy of policing, yet fail to deliver when it comes to supporting the tragic real victims, the families that experience bereavement through criminal acts. This includes families of police officers.

The work of the National Victims Association has been repeatedly spurned by Gordon Brown and his Government that are only too ready to pose for photographs and strike scandalous deals with Mr Gadaffi and his Libyan terrorist regime.

THE NVA

The National Victims Association provide a comprehensive advocacy, advice, counselling and support service to families bereaved through murder or manslaughter, and are widely regarded by many Government Ministers, statutory agencies, Police forces and Churches as the leading Charity specialising in this field of work. Their website provides details of their ground-breaking work, campaigns on behalf of bereaved families and the fight to obtain core funding from the Government.

BROKEN PROMISES FROM THE GOVERNMENT . . .
Home Office Minister Vernon Coaker MP made public promises to murder victims' families which were subsequently broken. He assured his audience that he would both fund and attend a conference in 2009, then refused to do either.

After numerous complaints about him breaking his promises, Mr Coaker wrote to David Hines of NVA, astonishingly claiming an entirely different interpretation to that of the 100+ bereaved families present. His letter and the reply of David Hines are available and we invite anyone interested to draw their own conclusions.

The next day, following a letter to Mr Coaker from Tim Boswell MP in which Mr Coaker was asked about not delivering on his conference pledges, Mr Coaker wrote to Mr Boswell. His letter was utterly and knowingly untruthful, claiming as it did that the Government had provided substantial sums of money to fund NVA’s core activities. The truth is that since 1992, NVA has received not one penny in core funding from any Government.

What Gordon Brown says...
“Every child is precious and irreplaceable and the death of a child is an unbearable sorrow that no parent should ever have to endure.”
House of Commons, 25th Feb 2009

What Gordon Brown does...
The Prime Minister has, for over a year, resolutely refused to acknowledge multiple requests to meet several NVA parents bereaved through murder. In May 2008 and on behalf of the families of 38 homicide victims - including one triple murder and two serving police officers - NVA wrote to Prime Minister Gordon Brown requesting a meeting to discuss their plight. He refused. Read the National Victims Association first letter to Mr Brown here.

Government Funding : The Truth

Because of the Government’s consistent refusal to tell the truth about NVA funding, the charity have now published a letter sent to Justice Minister Maria Eagle MP in April 2009. We also detail below, every payment ever received from the Government.

Core Funding - Amounts Received

1999 : Nil
2000 : Nil
2001 : Nil
2002 : Nil
2003 : Nil
2004 : Nil
2005 : Nil
2006 : Nil
2007 : Nil
2008 : Nil
2009 : Nil

Conference Funding : Amounts Received

1999 : Nil
2000 : Nil
2001 : Nil
2002 : Nil
2003 : Nil
2004 : Nil
2005 : Nil
2006 : Nil
2007 : Received £10,000 (50% of total costs)
2008 : Received £10,000 (50% of total costs)
2009 : Cancelled due to lack of funding

Project Funding : Amounts Received

2007 Project Costs £48,000, Received £25,000, Shortfall £23,000
2009 Project Costs £48,725, Received £30,985, Shortfall £17,740
2009/10 Project Costs £73,000

Yet another example of this Governments true motivation.

This is political spin at it most abhorrent, where tragic families most in need of compassion and support are denied assistance, where justice for murdered police officers is traded for commercial gain, and where the words "Victim Focus" only count for something if they can be used to political advantage.

Shame on you Mr Brown.