Topical issues

INTERVIEW: Having embarked on a policing career out of a strong desire to be “the person who helped”, Barrie Police Service Chief Rich Johnston found that evidence-based policing (EBP) instilled a real passion to make policing smarter, safer, and more transparent; and as he explained to Policing Insight’s Matthew Wood, while adopting and implementing an EBP philosophy has its challenges, it offers significant potential for positive transformation.

FEATURE: A partnership with the Leeds-based Domestic Violence and Abuse Voices Project providing “humbling, compelling and motivating” first-hand accounts of how women have been treated by police in the past is helping officers in West Yorkshire to gain greater insights and improve the service they deliver in domestic abuse cases, while giving victim-survivors a “life-changing” opportunity to vocalise their experiences and feel heard, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: As the Data (Use and Access) Bill makes its way through the UK Parliament, Canterbury Christ Church University Senior Lecturer in Policing, Dr David Lydon, looks at the potential implications of the new legislation on the use of automated decision-making in policing, and the opportunities and challenges it could present for police forces as well as the need to ensure safeguards for the public.

INNOVATION: A portal developed in Humberside that allows victims to contact officers in charge of their case for updates rather than tie-up call handlers on force phone lines is also helping to provide a better service, according to those behind the plan; Ian Weinfass spoke to Humberside Police’s Scot Dunn and senior responsible officer for the NPCC’s digital public contact programme, DCC Simon Megicks, about the award-winning initiative.

ANALYSIS: This year’s high-profile National Crime Agency takedown of the LockBit ransomware group, and the subsequent Endgame global cybercrime operation, was hailed as an example of successful law enforcement international collaboration; but IÉSEG School of Management professors Christine Abdalla Mikhaeil, Carin Venter and Jennifer Ziegelmayer warn that with many new players stepping into the ransomware market – and LockBit’s revival – greater international collaboration will be needed in the future.

FEATURE: A recent Europol-supported cross-border operation targeting VAT fraud saw accounts containing more than €520 million frozen, hundreds of properties seized, and at least 200 people investigated; Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at the efforts of law enforcement to tackle organised crime’s increasing involvement in cyber-enabled fraud.

WEBINAR PROMOTION: The Policing Tech Forum, in collaboration with the National Police Chiefs’ Council (NPCC) and techUK, are delighted to announce our inaugural series of webinars looking at the current and future direction of technology across the policing family.

FEATURE: A new CCTV system introduced by Cumbria Constabulary, which uses artificial intelligence analytics to search both stored and real-time footage to identify missing persons and suspect individuals and vehicles, is saving the force thousands of hours as well as improving outcomes, and could soon be accessible to officers out on patrol via mobile phones and laptops, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

CHRISTMAS MESSAGE: As most of us prepare to put our feet up for a fortnight to celebrate the festive period – and many police officers and staff get ready for some of their busiest nights of the year – Policing Insight Editor Keith Potter wonders why the Christmas wish of health and happiness in personal lives can’t also apply to the role of police officers and staff.

ANALYSIS: Police in England and Wales have, for the first time, collected and published detailed information gleaned from crime reports about child sex abuse and exploitation (CSAE) carried out by networks or groups, in a bid to put resources in the right areas and challenge assumptions with data along the way, as Policing Insight’s Ian Weinfass reports.

FEATURE: With the “global health emergency” of child sexual exploitation and abuse (CSAE) reaching harrowing levels, Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth looks at the work of Protect and Prevent Through Support – a Europe-wide initiative led by the Polish Platform for Homeland Security – in collating data and co-ordinating services to prevent CSAE.

ANALYSIS: Fraud accounts for a huge proportion of crime in the UK as well as other countries, with romance fraud particularly prevalent – and having significant impacts on victims over and above financial losses; Aston University Senior Lecturer Dr Rasha Kassem, an expert in fraud, explores the methods of those perpetrating romance frauds, the impacts on victims, and what police officers can do to combat the crime as well as provide support and reassurance.

OPINION: In response to the call for a new national Police Agency as set out in the recent ‘Fit for the Future’ paper published jointly by the Police Foundation and Leapwise Advisory, Canterbury Christ Church University Senior Lecturer in Policing, Dr David Lydon, suggests that, rather than pushing for greater centralisation, the cornerstone for effective police reform should be agility, inclusivity, and technological innovation.

ANALYSIS: The latest survey of survivors of rape and sexual assault into their experiences of the response by police in England and Wales has found that overall, Operation Soteria is improving the service delivered, but still only 40% of victims would report another sexual offence because of a lack of trust – although a series of simple steps could dramatically improve that reporting rate, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

OPINION: Former Police Scotland superintendent Martin Gallagher, now an author, journalist and terrorism expert, fears that causes on the left or politics maybe conflating – with supporters potentially moving from political agitation to political violence, in echoes of the 1970s – at a time when policing finds itself potentially blind to the threat, and adopting a position that many of the public view as radical.

ANALYSIS: Researchers at Europol have identified the challenges created by the enhanced privacy levels offered through home routing – a service established as part of the introduction and expansion of 5G – which could leave law enforcement agencies unable to undertake lawful interception of calls, messages and other data, as Policing Insight’s Andrew Staniforth reports.

OPINION: A new report from the five nations of the Five Eyes intelligence community highlights the increasing rates of online youth radicalisation, a threat borne out by the involvement of young people in every counter-terrorism case investigated this year by the Australian Federal Police; Greg Barton, Professor of Global Islamic Politics at the Alfred Deakin Institute, argues that while Australia already has good systems in place, the report offers valuable advice for parents, teachers, and any other agencies working with children and young people.

FEATURE: A report from the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change warns that UK’s current policing model is “fundamentally ill-suited” to tackling the huge threat of serious and organised crime, and urges the Government to establish a single UK-wide police force to lead on all crimes and threats that cross force boundaries, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

ANALYSIS: In the last in a series of five articles looking at the big debates in police use of facial recognition (FR), extracted from this year’s ‘Facing the future: The rise of facial recognition in policing’ report, Policing Insight’s James Sweetland explores the remarkable global variations in the legal and regulatory frameworks governing FR use, and whether a more effective approach can balance the obvious risks against the potential benefits to secure the best possible outcomes for public safety.

FEATURE: A 27-year-old paedophile was creating cartoonish pseudo child abuse images and distributing them among an online network; Detective Chief Inspector Jen Tattersall from Greater Manchester Police’s online child abuse investigations team tells Ian Weinfass how the force managed to bring a case against the offender, and safeguard real children at risk.

OPINION: Last month saw the jailing of Finlay Macdonald, who murdered his brother-in-law and attempted to kill three other people during a violent stabbing and shooting spree on the Isle of Skye and on the Scottish mainland; Michael Greville, a workplace violence reduction consultant who had a 30-year policing career, believes the case highlights the need for a review of Police Scotland’s armed response capabilities to ensure the safety of the public and officers, particularly in remote communities.

FEATURE: The latest Race Discrimination Report by the Independent Office for Police Conduct has highlighted continuing racial disparities in the use of police powers such as stop and search, and called on forces to address disproportionality in an effort to end the cycle of mistrust in minority ethnic communities, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

FEATURE: A new report from HM Inspectorate of Constabulary in Scotland has urged Police Scotland to allocate more posts to roads policing, improve training, and increase enforcement in an effort to cut down on the number of fatal and serious injury road accidents as well as deter poor and dangerous driving by the public, as Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons reports.

INTERVIEW: Having joined Peel Regional Police five years ago, Chief Nishan Duraiappah soon recognised the challenges facing the force, and set about implementing a change programme to create “the most progressive, innovative and inclusive service in the galaxy” – one which needed needs “to look and feel like it has a start-up mentality”, as he explained to Policing Insight’s Sarah Gibbons.