The Police Complaints Authority Annual Report 1988
01 January 1991
The Police Complaints Authority Annual Report 1988
bacdoc July=1991
The POlice Complaints Authority's (PCA) annual report was released
on 26 April 1989 and noted several areas of concern from its
perspective, these were:
That a high number of complaints `fall by the wayside, principally
for a lack of credibility or corroboration'.
Some complainants refuse to be interviewed by the investigating
police officer or to provide a statement.
Some police forces are slow to bring cases to a disciplinary
hearing.
`Many of the incidents that lead to complaints result from a lack
of tact and professionalism by the police in dealing with a
situation;this could be remedied by regular training and better
management supervision'.
That each year there are a number of police officers involved in a
complaint allegation who resign or are allowed to retire on medical
grounds before their case comes to a disciplinary hearing.
That some police forces maintain that any information which comes
into their possession no matter from what source can be used to
defend their officers `or to attack claimants, in civil or other
proceedings'.
Comment: Within the terms of the PCA these are clearly matters of
concern but, as will become evident, they fail to ask more
fundamental questions. For example, they do not record the number
of complaints withdrawn or not pursued.
HOW THE PCA WORKS
Part XI of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 created the
new procedure and set out how it should work. Section 87 provides
that `complaints alleging that the conduct in question resulted in
the death of, or serious injury to some person', or involves
assault occasioning actual bodily harm, corruption or a serious
arrestable offence, have to be referred to the PCA so that it can
decide whether or not to supervise the investigation.
Section 88 permits the `appropriate authority'(either the Chief
Constable or the police authority if of chief superintendent rank
or above. Section 89 gives the PCA powers of supervision of the
investigation, to approve the appointment of the investigating
officer and to make requirements on the conduct of the
investigation. It also empowers the PCA to supervise other cases
`if they consider that it is in the public interest that they
should do so.' The same procedure for supervising a complaint under
Section 85 provides a means of dealing with complaints `with a
minimum of formality and it is used by Forces for dealing with
complaints of a relatively minor nature'.
The PCA report then states that the statistics provided cannot be
properly analysed `without access to data on informal resolution
(S.85) and withdrawn cases held by Forces'. This information it
says can be obtained from Her Majesty's Inspector of Constabulary
annual report and from that of the Commissioner for London.
The Commissioner's report for 1988 does not carry this information
- as it has done in past years.
The statistics provided by the PCA require some highly diligent
study to make sense of them, and some information is provided
below. However, it seems extraordinary that a body that purports to
deal with complaints against the police, and fully aware of the
public scepticism, does not provide - the total number of
complaints made, the numbers withdrawn, the numbers determined
informally, with a full breakdown by force and by local division.
THE STATISTICS
The report makes a distinction between cases and complaints - there
may be several complaints related to one case.
The overall figures are - 5,516 cases containing 12,523 matters of
complaint were concluded by the PCA. Under S.87 and S.88 a total of
4,397 cases in the year were referred to the authority to decide
whether the investigation should be supervised or not.
These figures include most of the 867 complaints received directly
by the PCA from members of the public - these are required to be
sent back to the<