Analysis  (Page 85)

ANALYSIS: Police forces have been urged to improve their data capture and analysis around non-fatal strangulation and suffocation after a new report from the Institute for Addressing Strangulation highlighted a 65% increase in the number of recorded cases in 2023-24, but 70% of cases failing to progress to court and little clear or consistent data about victims or suspects, as Policing Insight’s Keith Potter reports.

ANALYSIS: The UK Government’s latest Wastewater Analysis Programme report has highlighted an estimated 85% increase in ketamine use, prompting National Police Chiefs’ Council National Drugs Co-ordinator Mark Lay to call for more data sharing and closer collaboration between police and other agencies to make young people more aware of the dangers of the drug, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: New research suggests that Australians living in rural areas are more likely to support tougher penalties for crime than those in the cities; Caitlan Davey, Dr Kyle Mulrooney and Dr Sue Watt explain the reasons behind this divide, the implications for policing and the criminal justice system, and what can be done to address it.

FEATURE: A new report from animal welfare charity the Naturewatch Foundation is calling for mandatory training for UK police officers to recognise how animals are used in domestic abuse cases involving coercive control, after highlighting a “postcode lottery” in the current approaches of forces across England and Wales, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

ANALYSIS: After the tragic murder of a 19-year-old woman in 2022, Essex Police set about changing how it assesses known and suspected perpetrators of domestic violence and developed an approach to stop them that had been “stolen with pride” from tackling gangs; Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass spoke to Detective Superintendent Matt Cornish and Detective Constable Robert Kedar about their work.

FEATURE: A Home Office-commissioned evaluation of the UK police use of naloxone highlights that not only is the opioid overdose reversal medication a potential life-saver, but its wider carriage by officers could help to build more trust and stronger relationships with drug-using communities – if challenges can be addressed around training and data collection, collaboration with healthcare agencies on handover and aftercare, and officers’ own stigma around drug users, reports Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.

INTERVIEW: Policing Insight's Sarah Gibbons spoke to Polly Harrar – founder of the Sharan Project, Chair of the London Harmful Practices Group led by the Metropolitan Police, violence against women and girls (VAWG) advocate, and women in leadership trainer – about the need to improve the systems in place for tackling VAWG, the dangers of weighing cultural considerations in the fight against sexual crimes and child abuse, and the importance of training for women leaders.

OPINION: The proposed Strong Borders Act, a bill currently before the Canadian Parliament, includes measures that will enable police to obtain information about an individual’s online activity by obtaining a warrant on a lower standard of reasonable suspicion of a crime, instead of probable cause; Thompson Rivers University Professor of Law Robert Diab argues that the new powers will turn tech companies such as Google, Apple, Shaw and Telus into agents of the state.

INTERVIEW: With this week’s official launch of the Neighbourhood Policing Programme (NPP) career pathway across England and Wales, Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons spoke to Chief Superintendent Andy Sidebotham, Head of Uniformed Policing at the College of Policing, about the reasons for introducing the NPP, the make-up of the training modules, and what the new programme aims to achieve.

FEATURE: Chief constables, police and crime commissioners, and directors of public health across England and Wales have been sent new guidance and warnings about the dangers of a potential influx of harmful new drugs – including synthetic opioids – which could present greater risks to “those who are drug-naive or experimenting for the first time” at this summer’s music festivals, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: US President Donald Trump has declared himself as “the most police president in the history of America”; but Liverpool John Moores University Policing Lecturer James Williams argues that the administration’s latest legislative measures and approaches to immigration look set to undermine efforts to build trust with many communities across the US, and ultimately make the job of a US police tougher than ever.

OPINION: While the recent Government Spending Review left many chief constables, forces and police and crime commissioners in England and Wales saying the increase in police spending wasn’t enough, University of Leeds Professor of Crime Science Graham Farrell argues that more money and more officers doesn’t always lead to a fall in crime, with crime prevention and reducing crime opportunities by working with businesses, suppliers and manufacturers often a more effective approach.

FEATURE: A new report into male victim-survivor views on the criminalisation of coercive control in Australia, published by an international team of researchers, has highlighted both the majority support for new legislation, but also concerns about the potential misuse or ineffectiveness of an offence of coercive control, unless there is “whole of system change” across the criminal justice sector, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

FEATURE: Scottish Justice Secretary Angela Constance has praised Scottish police superintendents for their role in leading innovation and collaboration that has ensured Police Scotland can meet the challenges of modern crime – despite a backdrop of a “challenging financial environment” which has left the force and the Government with “no quick fixes” and limited choices, as Policing Insight’s Martin Gallagher reports.

ANALYSIS: A recent court ruling on the routine use of in-custody strip searches of four teenage girls in youth detention found that the warrantless, standardless routine strip search of teenage prisoners is unreasonable, as is any law that authorizes it; Monika Lemke, PhD Candidate at Canada’s York University, believes the ruling importantly recognizes the goal of minimizing the use of strip searches in every context they are employed, and could have wider implications for Canadian policing generally.

FEATURE: A new review published by Clinks and researched by the Neurodivergence in Criminal Justice Network has highlighted a “pervasive lack of awareness and understanding of how neurodivergent people present” within the UK criminal justice system, and sets out a raft of measures to overcome the significant barriers they experience, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: With a growing drive in Australia for a co-responder rather than police-first response to those in mental health crisis, University of Melbourne Research Officer Dr Panos Karanikolas, and La Trobe University’s Dr Chris Maylea and Hamilton Kennedy, explore what works better and where, with research suggesting people with lived experience of mental health issues want more than ambulances replacing the police as crisis responders.

FEATURE: Association of Scottish Police Superintendents President Rob Hay has urged Police Scotland’s leadership not to take officers for granted as superintending ranks begin to “vote with their feet” and withdraw from volunteering for on-call, and called on the Scottish Government to invest in a service that is “stretched to breaking point”, warning that Chief Constable Jo Farrell faces the “stark choice” of cannibalising the service to provide a fair pay award, as Policing Insight’s Martin Gallagher reports.

INTERVIEW: Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass spoke to Metropolitan Police Service Director of Data Aimee Smith and Deputy Director of Data Samantha Laskey about how they overcame a traditional culture and delays to develop policing’s first open data strategy.

ANALYSIS: After nearly two decades of focus, discussion and research, mental health and wellbeing among British police officers and staff shows little improvement; Professor Emma Williams and Associate Professor Sarah-Jane Lennie of the Centre of Excellence for Equities in Uniformed Public Services argue that, juxtaposed with the persistent and challenging issues related to police recruitment, retention, presenteeism and long-term sickness, the evidence suggests a growing mental health crisis within British policing.

OPINION: With the UK Government recently announcing that the Vagrancy Act will be repealed by spring next year, Generation Rent Chief Executive Ben Twomey looks at the background to a 200-year-old piece of “outdated” legislation that is still used to criminalise some aspects of homelessness, and considers what may take its place.

OPINION: As part of US President Donald Trump’s framework for large deportations of undocumented immigrants, there has been a huge increase in 287(g) agreements allowing police to function as federal immigration officers, interviewing and detaining people before handing them over to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE); St Edward’s University Professor W. Carsten Andresen argues that many police forces have found such actions significantly undermine trust and public safety.

FEATURE: The first spotlight report from the Ontario Inspector General of Policing Ryan Teschner looking at the policing of protests and major events has highlighted the changing shapes, frequency and complexity of demonstrations, as well as a policing model that puts too much demand on specific services, leaving officers facing significant fatigue and adding to recruitment challenges for the specialised role, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

FEATURE: A new report from HM Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services into the UK police response to organised immigration crime (OIC) has called for greater collaboration between forces, better intelligence gathering and sharing, and for OIC to become a higher law enforcement priority in order to tackle the organised crime groups involved, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.