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Complaints - 082/20

Date Responded 22 January 2020

Provision of information held by Northumbria Police made under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the 'Act')

As you may be aware the purpose of the Act is to allow a general right of access to information held at the time of a request, by a Public Authority (including the Police), subject to certain limitations and exemptions.

You asked:

  1. When a complaint about a crime being committed by a police officer is made through the IOPC how soon is it received by professional standards?
  2. Is the complaint treat differently when a police officer has committed a crime as well as misconduct?
  3. How many members of staff read the complaint before it is given to the Chief Inspector to make a decision to record the complaint?

In Response:

Following receipt of your request, searches were conducted with the Professional Standards Department of Northumbria Police.  I can confirm that the information you have requested is held by Northumbria Police.

I am able to disclose the located information to you as follows.

  1. An IOPC submission can be received by email between 24 -72 hours from initial report.
  2. The allegation is received by the force assessor and acted upon accordingly. The steps taken would be entirely dependent upon the nature of complaint.
  3. There is no recorded number on how many members of staff read a complaint. Outside of the Act, I can advise that complaints are reviewed by the compliance service advisors, a team that consists of three people. It is then transferred to the force assessor.

Disclaimer

Due to the different methods of recording information across 43 forces, a specific response from one constabulary should not be seen as an indication of what information could be supplied (within cost) by another. Systems used for recording these figures are not generic, nor are the procedures used locally in capturing the data. For this reason responses between forces may differ, and should not be used for comparative purposes.

The information we have supplied to you is likely to contain intellectual property rights of Northumbria Police. Your use of the information must be strictly in accordance with the Copyright Designs and Patents Act 1988 (as amended) or such other applicable legislation. In particular, you must not re-use this information for any commercial purpose.

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