Police In England Research Articles

How the Timing of Police Evidence Disclosure Impacts Custodial Legal Advice

Presently, the police in England and Wales disclose their evidence at different points during the arrest and detention of a suspect. While the courts have not objected to this, past field research suggests that lawyers can only advise their clients accurately when the police disclose their evidence before the police interview. To examine this from a law – psychology perspective, we recruited 100 criminal defence lawyers to participate in an online study. Lawyers read fictional scenarios and provided custodial legal advice to a hypothetical client (Christopher) when given either pre-interview disclosure or disclosure at various points during the police interview (early, gradually, or late). Lawyers given pre-interview disclosure provided considerably more informed legal advice compared to those who were only provided with disclosure during the hypothetical police interview. Using an interdisciplinary approach, this paper provides further evidence that pre-interview disclosure is essential for lawyers to deliver case-specific legal advice to suspects.

Police culture, talk and action: narratives in ethnographic data

The idea of police culture is almost as old as the field of police studies itself, and has been traced to the coincidence of concerns about violent and discriminatory police conduct with shifts in intellectual fashion, including a turn towards ethnography. This article considers some criticisms of the idea of police culture before engaging with a recent narrative turn in analysis. Drawing on fieldnotes from an ongoing ethnographic study of police in England it explores the use of a narrative approach to fieldnotes. The article concludes that extending the narrative approach to police work in this way shows significant potential for developing our understanding of why police behave as they do. Ethnography alone can provide the kinds of unique insights into overlapping and interconnected narratives that help to situate and order the particularities of police work in relation to the broader social and political context.

Mental health training programmes for non-mental health trained professionals coming into contact with people with mental ill health: a systematic review of effectiveness

BackgroundThe police and others in occupations where they come into close contact with people experiencing/with mental ill health, often have to manage difficult and complex situations. Training is needed to equip them to recognise and assist when someone has a mental health issue or learning/intellectual disability. We undertook a systematic review of the effectiveness of training programmes aimed at increasing knowledge, changing behaviour and/or attitudes of the trainees with regard to mental ill health, mental vulnerability, and learning disabilities.MethodsDatabases searched from 1995 onwards included: ASSIA, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Clinical Trials (CENTRAL), Criminal Justice s, Embase, ERIC, MEDLINE, PsycINFO, Social Science Citation Index. Courses, training, or learning packages aimed at helping police officers and others who interact with the public in a similar way to deal with people with mental health problems were included. Primary outcomes were change in practice and change in outcomes for the groups of people the trainees come into contact with. Systematic reviews, randomised controlled trials (RCTs) and non- randomised controlled trials (non-RCTs) were included and quality assessed. In addition non-comparative evaluations of training for police in England were included.ResultsFrom 8578 search results, 19 studies met the inclusion criteria: one systematic review, 12 RCTs, three prospective non-RCTs, and three non-comparative studies.The training interventions identified included broad mental health awareness training and packages addressing a variety of specific mental health issues or conditions. Trainees included police officers, teachers and other public sector workers.Some short term positive changes in behaviour were identified for trainees, but for the people the trainees came into contact with there was little or no evidence of benefit.ConclusionsA variety of training programmes exist for non-mental health professionals who come into contact with people who have mental health issues. There may be some short term change in behaviour for the trainees, but longer term follow up is needed. Research evaluating training for UK police officers is needed in which a number of methodological issues need to be addressed.Trial registrationProtocol registration number: PROSPERO: CRD42015015981.

The Police Use of Social Media: Transformation or Normalisation?

There has been optimism that social media will facilitate citizen participation and transform the communication strategies of public organisations. Drawing on a case study of the public police in England, this article considers whether social media are transforming or normalising communications. Arguing that social media have not yet served to facilitate interaction between constabularies and citizens in the ways that have been proposed and desired, the article considers factors that structure the transformative potential of social media. It is argued that the uses of social media are mediated by the existing organisational and occupational concerns of the police. This article reveals how an interplay of organisational, technological and individual and cultural dynamics come together to shape how social media are used in constabularies. Embedding social media into police communications is challenging and the technology itself will not bring about the organisational and cultural changes needed to transform police–citizen engagement.

The re-professionalization of the police in England and Wales

In this article contemporary police claims to professional status are analysed and related to a new structure of police regulation in England and Wales. It is argued that the notion of the police as a profession is not new and, unlike police and academic commentary, analysis of this subject should draw on sociological understandings of professions. The wider policy context within which claims to professionalization are made is also considered. A new, loosely coupled system of regulation has been developed in England and Wales. Policing’s professional body, the College of Policing, is central to this regulatory framework that has placed government at a distance from constabularies and police representative associations. Finally, some of the consequences of the hybrid system are considered and benefits of the framework of analysis proposed are discussed.

Civilian oversight of the police in England and Wales

The creation of Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs) in England and Wales in November 2012 by the Conservative/Liberal Democrat Coalition government, replacing the former police authorities, introduced a new mechanism for civilian oversight of the police. However, the new structure has been heavily criticised, both for the election process and for the ways in which newly elected PCCs have operated. Despite these criticisms, PCCs were retained by the new Conservative government, and the scheduled round of new elections took place in May 2016. This article assesses these elections and compares them with those 2012, in terms of the election process and the attributes of the candidates and those successfully elected.

‘Walking on egg shells’

The aim of this present work is to explore police officers’ experiences and views in respect of male rape. I critically examine the role of the police, and their experiences and perceptions of handling male rape cases. This study presents detailed, in-depth, and rich data from the police in England. The findings are generated from the police, male rape counsellors, male rape therapists and voluntary agency workers. The participants were interviewed and filled out qualitative questionnaires, which were kept anonymous. I ensured that those who were interviewed did not also fill out a questionnaire, as each method addresses issues in a different form. To inform the development of the semi-structured interview schedule and the qualitative questionnaires, I drew on Abdullah-Khan (2008) in order to shape the types of questions that I asked. Overall, this study gained a sample size of 70 participants. In this paper, I solely focus on state agencies’ responses and attitudes toward male rape. From the findings, five distinct themes emerged: (1) level of communications between officers and victims; (2) perpetuation of male rape myths and stereotypes by judges and juries; (3) lack of evidence in male rape cases; (4) attrition in male rape cases; and (5) issues of consent in male rape cases. There are serious concerns in terms of how the criminal justice system deals with male rape victims, resulting not only in poor treatment of the victims, but also increasing the attrition rate and decreasing the conviction rate in male rape cases. I attempt to tackle poor police practice herein.

A question of scandal? The police and the phone-hacking business

Scandals have featured consistently in the development and operation of public policing in England and Wales. However, criminologists have rarely explored scandal as a concept or its attempted management by criminal justice organizations. This article contributes to the filling of this gap with the intention of initiating debate on the utility of scandal as a conceptual tool for the analysis of policing and criminal justice. It identifies the core components of a scandal using an analytical framework informed by scandal research undertaken across disciplinary areas. Taking a case study approach, this framework is applied to the Leveson Inquiry which explored a combination of potentially scandalous episodes within the overarching scandal of phone-hacking. The article concludes that phone-hacking was a scandal at macro and micro levels under this framework yet damage to the reputation of the police was mitigated through active impression management and enduring characteristics of the police image.

Arming the police in Britain

In 2010 Derrick Bird shot and killed 12 people, as well as injuring a further 11, in Cumbria. A legitimate question that arose after the tragedy was whether the outcome would have been different if the British police had been armed? This paper explores whether human rights law requires, or at least justifies, the UK authorities to arm the police in the pursuit of public protection? Derrick Bird was licensed to possess his firearms. Is a more proportionate response amendments to the existing weapons certification process? These are some of the questions which this article seeks to address.

How the timing of police evidence disclosure impacts custodial legal advice

Presently, the police in England and Wales disclose their evidence at different points during the arrest and detention of a suspect. While the courts have not objected to this, past field research suggests that lawyers can only advise their clients accurately when the police disclose their evidence before the police interview. To examine this from a law/psychology perspective, we recruited 100 criminal defence lawyers to participate in an online study. Lawyers read fictional scenarios and provided custodial legal advice to a hypothetical client (Christopher) when given either pre-interview disclosure or disclosure at various points during the police interview (early, gradually or late). Lawyers given pre-interview disclosure provided considerably more informed legal advice compared to those who were only provided with disclosure during the hypothetical police interview. Using an interdisciplinary approach, this article provides further evidence that pre-interview disclosure is essential for lawyers to deliver case-specific legal advice to suspects.

Experiences of Autism Spectrum Disorder and Policing in England and Wales: Surveying Police and the Autism Community.

An online survey gathered the experiences and views of 394 police officers (from England and Wales) regarding autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Just 42% of officers were satisfied with how they had worked with individuals with ASD and reasons for this varied. Although officers acknowledged the need for adjustments, organisational/time constraints were cited as barriers. Whilst 37% of officers had received training on ASD, a need for training tailored to policing roles (e.g., frontline officers, detectives) was identified. Police responses are discussed with respect to the experiences of the ASD community (31 adults with ASD, 49 parents), who were largely dissatisfied with their experience of the police and echoed the need for police training on ASD.

The Vagrancy Act (1824) and the Persistence of Pre-emptive Policing in England since 1750

This article argues that research into preventive and pre-emptive crime control in the United Kingdom has marginalized the historical persistence of the power to arrest and convict on justified suspicion of intent. It traces the genesis of this power in statute law (particularly the Vagrancy Act of 1824) and demonstrates its consistent use in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It shows how this pre-emptive power was fiercely defended by police authorities, particularly during the rise of the ‘civil liberties’ agenda during the 1930s, only losing ground when use of these powers became entangled with debates about race relations in the 1970s. Overall, the article argues that ‘pre-emptive’ arrest and conviction on suspicion of intent have been a significant component of UK police powers since the later eighteenth century, and seeks to demonstrate the value of historical criminology in problematizing contemporary debates.

Community policing in England, Wales, and European Union: Past, present and future

Community policing philosophy has become an attractive field within the policing literature, exercised enthusiastically by police forces across England and Wales as a response to police and crime related issues ranging from poor policepublic relations to minor crime and disorder. This paper provides a critical appraisal of community participation and problem solving elements of community policing before moving onto explaining how they have been implemented in England, Wales, and European Union. Finally, this study also highlights that there are stubborn and very serious financial, organisational and cultural challenges regarding the successful application of community policing schemes in England, Wales, and European Union

The Establishment and Development of Modern Police in England : Focus on the Traditionalism and Revisionism

The Establishment and Development of Modern Police in England : Focus on the Traditionalism and Revisionism

The Experiences of People With Mental Health Problems Who Are Victims of Crime With the Police in England: A Qualitative Study

Despite public beliefs to the contrary, people with mental health problems are more likely to be victims of crime than perpetrators. Dominant media representations of the mentally ill person who murders, has deflected attention from the victim with mental health problems including their experiences of accessing the criminal justice system. The qualitative study explored the experiences of 81 people with mental health problems in their decision making and experiences of reporting the crime to the police. Many of their experiences were the same as other victims. However, their mental health problems were often seen as a label that stigmatized them, and their reports were discredited and disbelieved. This study offers insights relevant to policy and professional practice and education.

Clare’s Law, or the national Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme

Clare’s Law has been a PR success for the police in England and Wales—the police have engaged directly with the media over the national roll-out of the Domestic Violence Disclosure Scheme. But the precise operation of the Scheme, at a doctrinal level, is unclear, and warrants further scrutiny (and, I would argue, reform) before a crisis of confidence in the Scheme is precipitated by a challenge by way of judicial review. Human rights case law concerning the procedural rights of (suspected) domestic violence perpetrators is the medium through which this piece explores the manner in which the Scheme currently operates on the basis of Home Office guidance and policy.

Analysis and Prediction of Crimes by Clustering and Classification

Crimes will somehow influence organizations and institutions when occurred frequently in a society. Thus, it seems necessary to study reasons, factors and relations between occurrence of different crimes and finding the most appropriate ways to control and avoid more crimes. The main objective of this paper is to classify clustered crimes based on occurrence frequency during different years. Data mining is used extensively in terms of analysis, investigation and discovery of patterns for occurrence of different crimes. We applied a theoretical model based on data mining techniques such as clustering and classification to real crime dataset recorded by police in England and Wales within 1990 to 2011. We assigned weights to the features in order to improve the quality of the model and remove low value of them. The Genetic Algorithm (GA) is used for optimizing of Outlier Detection operator parameters using RapidMiner tool.

Timothy Brain. The Future for Policing in England and Wales

The ‘Future for Policing in England and Wales’ continues the narrative from Dr Timothy Brain’s previous work, ‘The History of Policing in England and Wales since 1974: a Turbulent Journey’ and brings the story up to date discussing the reformation of policing by the coalition government of David Cameron. The book particularly focuses on the fundamental changes which have been pushed through by the current government since 2010. It looks back over the previous decade to explore the signs of the change of philosophy in the Conservative Party which were clear for those who were looking. Brain finishes by looking at the future for policing, though by the final chapter, the title has gained a question mark possibly signifying the uncertainty of any attempt to look forward, but also raising a question about whether the traditional style of policing actually has a future. Those familiar with Brain’s previous book will not be surprised that this work is very thoroughly researched and referenced. It recounts the changes from the view of someone who was affected by them as a senior police leader since 1994 and the Chief Constable of a provincial police force in England between 2001 and 2010. As such it makes no pretence of being dispassionate account of the changes being discussed. It is the view of someone who is committed to, and had been a close observer of, policing for many years and is concerned about the direction in which he sees it being pushed.

The Case for the Acceptable 'Other': The Impact of Partnerships, PCSOs, and Neighbourhood Policing on Diversity in Policing

Policing in England and Wales has experienced several significant events and developments since the murder of Stephen Lawrence in 1993. Although the Lawrence Report is perhaps the most well-known among these, other initiatives such as multi-agency partnerships, the creation of the Police Community Support Officer role and the national roll-out of Neighbourhood Policing have also had a marked impact on the organization. Using findings from two research projects, this article will argue that policing in England and Wales is far more outward-focused and open to collaboration with a diverse range of people, agencies and staff than has ever been the case. This has led to a noticeable shift in cultural orientation among some segments of service. However, the current funding restrictions in policing put all of these developments, from operational matters to wider ethos, at risk.

Diagnosing vulnerability and “dangerousness”: police use of Section 136 in England and Wales

Purpose – Police in England and Wales are empowered, under Section 136 of the Mental Health Act 1983 (s136), to detain individuals thought to be a danger to themselves or to others. Use of this authority is widespread, but varies across districts and attracts controversy because of inconsistent application and the fact that it requires police to make judgements about mental health. The purpose of this paper is to examine police attitudes to and criteria for using s136. Design/methodology/approach – The authors conducted focus groups with 30 officers in urban and rural areas of three different regions across England and Wales. Group interviews were audio-recorded, transcribed, and analysed using open and axial coding. Findings – Use of s136 authority has major implications for police work; liaison with mental health services is seen as desirable but often ineffective due to resource constraints and the latter's lack of availability. The decision to invoke s136 depends on social context and other particulars of individual cases. Research limitations/implications – Although the findings have limitations with respect to generalisability across the whole of the UK, there are patterns of responses which have major implications for policy recommendations. Practical implications – Police decisions to apply s136 reflect an implicit values-based classification of and response to emotionally disturbed behaviour, in light of available institutional and social supports. Social implications – Tasked primarily with protecting the public and keeping the peace, police “diagnoses” of risk often contrast with that of mental health professionals. Originality/value – A highly original piece of research which has attracted further funding from BA/Leverhulme.