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. The number of officers convicted of a sexual offence as defined by the Sexual Offences Act 2003 in the last three years e.g. rape, assault by penetration, sexual assault, rape of a child under 13 and where possible break down by:
a) year
b) type of sexual offence
c) rank of officer
2. The number of officers convicted of other offences in the last three years and where possible break down by:
a) year
b) type of offence, eg. common assault, criminal damage, GBH
c) by rank of officer
3. The number of police staff convicted of a sexual offence as covered under the Sexual Offences Act 2003 in the last three years, as in point one, and where possible broken down by year and type of offence.
4. The number of police staff convicted of other offences in the last three years as in point two, and where possible broken down by year and type of offence.
5. The number of convicted police officers as set out in points one and two that were handed prison sentences or suspended prison sentences for these convictions, and where possible broken down by
a) sexual offences or other offences
b) year
6. The number of police staff as set out in point three and four that were handed prison sentences or suspended prison sentences, and if possible broken down by
a) sexual offences or other offences
b) year
7. Of the officers convicted of a sexual offence as covered under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, how many of these retained their job in the force, and how many of these serve in the force currently (if these numbers differ)?
8. Of the officers convicted of other offences, how many of these retained their job in the force AND who serve in the force currently (if these numbers differ)?
9. Of the staff convicted of a sexual offence as covered under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, how many of these retained their job in the force AND who serve in the force currently (if these numbers differ)?
10. Of the staff convicted of other offences, how many of these retained their job in the force AND who serve in the force currently (if these numbers differ)?
11. Of the officers and staff who retained their job with the force, how many faced internal disciplinary proceedings?
In Response:
We have now had the opportunity to fully consider your request and I provide a response for your attention.
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 in part by Northumbria Police.
I am able to disclose the located information to you as follows.
1. None.
2 & 5. The information requested at these points, will not be provided due to low numbers and we will rely on the following exemption:
Section 40(2) - Personal Information
Section 40(2) is a class based absolute exemption and there is no requirement to consider the public interest in disclosure. That being said where Section 40(2) is engaged in order to make the exemption absolute there needs to be evidence that the disclosure of the information requested would lead to identifying individuals and place information pertaining to them into the public domain. This constitutes personal data which would, if released, be in breach of the rights provided by the Data Protection Act 2018 and General Data Protection Regulations; namely the first data protection principle, which states that personal data will be processed lawfully, fairly and transparently.
It is our view that the request runs counter to the three requirements prescribed by law and that there is no lawful basis to provide this information to you.
In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, you should consider this as a refusal for these parts of your request.
3. None.
4. None.
6. N/a as our response to points 3 and 4 is negative.
7. N/a as our response to point 1 is negative.
8. None.
9. N/a as our response to point 3 is negative.
10. N/a as our response to points 4 is negative.
11. N/a as our response to points 7-10 are negative.
Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from a number of data sources used by forces for police purposes. The detail collected to respond specifically to your request is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large scale recording system. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are taken into account when interpreting those data.
The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of relevance of data to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures for ad hoc requests may have limitations and this should be taken into account when those data are used.
