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:
- Please can you tell me the number of referrals to the CPS by your force for a prosecution under the Fraud Act 2006 or conspiracy to defraud involving phone or mobile phone fraud were rejected/ not taken forward by the CPS for the calendar years (by this I mean cases brought to the CPS by your police force that were not taken to prosecution for whatever reason, eg. Lack of evidence etc.)
2017
2018
2019 to date
2. Which investigations under the Fraud Act 2006 or conspiracy to defraud involving phones or mobile phones have resulted in a successful prosecution in the last three calendar years? Case Names please?
3.Please can you tell me how many specialist officers you have in the force to investigate Frauds involving phones or mobile phones?
After we sought clarity you advised:
Please can you let us know the number of offences involving mobile phones or using mobile phones under the below Home Office Charging codes.
Please look for offences involving the following codes involving phones, computers and mobile phones, so all of the examples you quoted ie:
- Offenders trying to get you to buy phone related products or to make calls to premium services or sign up to subscription services, are often referred to as phone scams.
- Where the offender has called the victim to perpetrate a scam – i.e. withdrawing money from an account.
- Or where fraudsters use personal details to take out phone contracts in victims’ names;
And the Home Office codes:
53/4 Conspiracy to defraud, Criminal Justice Act 1987, Section 12
53/34 Computer Misuse crime - unauthorised access, Computer Misuse Act 1990, Section 2
53/35 Computer Misuse crime - Computer Misuse Act 1990, Section 3
53/40 Fraud by False Representation, Fraud Act 2006, Section 2
53/41 Fraud by failing to disclose information, Fraud Act 2006, Section 3
53/43 Possess/ control articles for use in Fraud Fraud Act 2006, Section 6
53/44 Making/supplying articles for use in Fraud, Fraud Act 2006, Section 7
In Response:
I am able to disclose the located information to you as follows.
1-2.
|
Offences |
Charges |
|
|
2017 |
2098 |
304 |
|
2018 |
2468 |
261 |
|
2019* |
1789 |
155 |
* Data supplied covers the period 1 January to 21 October 2019
3.The force does not have specialist officers to investigate frauds involving phones or mobile phones exclusively. It does however have a Digital Forensic Unit that includes phone examiners that examine the devices themselves but do not investigate the fraud; this is dealt primarily by the Complex Fraud Unit.
