80% of UK police accused of domestic abuse kept jobs, figures show

[EmbarrassingHadrosaurus]

Is there no end to this?

80% of UK police accused of domestic abuse kept jobs, figures show

Experts and campaigners say data is further evidence of misogyny in ranks and poor leadership

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/17/80-percent-of-uk-police-accused-of-domestic-abuse-kept-jobs-figures-show

The criminal justice and legal systems fail women at every level and there seems to be no drive to change the culture that facilitates it.

A series of freedom of information requests by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism showed that 1,080 out of 1,319 police officers and staff who were reported for alleged domestic abuse during a three-year period were still working. Replies were received from 41 forces across the UK.

Just 36 officers and staff, 2.7% of the total reported, were dismissed, while 203 either resigned or retired or left for other reasons.

Disciplinary actions, which can include written warnings or suspension, were taken against 120 officers and staff, 9.1% of the total.

The conviction rate of police officers and staff for domestic abuse is 3.4%, lower than the 6.3% in the general population.

[ScreamingMeMe]

How unsurprising

What on earth can be done when the misogyny is so entrenched?

[bonfireheart]

"Accused of"

[EmbarrassingHadrosaurus]

@bonfireheart

"Accused of"

I seem to have lost the previous response.

However, I wonder if you might pause to consider how difficult it is to make a complaint about a serving officer when it's likely to be a local service and to that officer's colleagues? Beyond that, how many barriers there are to having that complaint investigated?

Former Scotland Yard Deputy Assistant Commissioner David Gilbertson said he believed, “in terms of scale”, police officer perpetrated domestic abuse was an “epidemic” that “must not be minimised”.

He added: “It is about men in authority exercising power over women and it is about failure of leadership on an epic scale in policing.

“I know of cases where officers who were attached to Domestic Violence Units actively searched out vulnerable women for sexual gratification and in order to gain access to their children for sexual purposes.”

A Freedom of Information request by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism found that from 2015 to 2018, there were almost 700 reports of domestic violence involving police officers and staff.

www.channel4.com/news/more-than-100-women-accuse-police-officers-of-domestic-abuse-alleging-boys-club-culture

There were several discussions of the rate of domestic violence among police personnel in the threads about Sarah Everard. It's notable that a number of complaints had been made about her notorious killer and we are too sadly aware of the failures there.

[MrMrsJones]

How many were convicted, not just reported.

[EmbarrassingHadrosaurus]

@MrMrsJones

How many were convicted, not just reported.

You might consult the link in the OP for a sense of that?

See the above comments from Gilbertson and the general comments about the difficulties of progressing to an investigation.

Are you curious as to what might explain the different conviction rate for police officers relative to the general public on this?

[MrMrsJones]

Many people can be reported for DV, but how many have actually received a caution or have been charged with the offence.

Suspension from work, could mean "while the investigation was ongoing" they may have been found with no case to answer and reinstated.

I myself was suspended from work for posting stuff about women's rights, but was found not to be in the wrong and went back to work. I would have been included in the stats.

[EmbarrassingHadrosaurus]

@MrMrsJones

Many people can be reported for DV, but how many have actually received a caution or have been charged with the offence.

Suspension from work, could mean "while the investigation was ongoing" they may have been found with no case to answer and reinstated.

I myself was suspended from work for posting stuff about women's rights, but was found not to be in the wrong and went back to work. I would have been included in the stats.

I appreciate the nuance of what you say.

You were found not to be in the wrong. Presumably, this followed an investigation. A common finding seems to be that those who complain of DA/DV find it difficult to have their complaint investigated.

I'm unclear what your overall argument is. You doubt DV is an issue in the context under discussion? Or your disagreement is grounded in how the Guardian reported the information?

As a matter of interest, the paucity of investigation following complaints about Couzens kept him employed and your argument is that that was right and proper and not a red flag as to any possible risks that he posed?

[butnobodytoldme]

I believe most of the institutions unchanged for a century must need, not tweaking, but re-thinking. What is the aim? Including research of best practice elsewhere, and including latest technology, how should it be reached?
It is not disputed that the NHS needs more than tweaks. It must be equally obvious the way the country is governed does, and the civil service does (see today's Times, on DVLA, for example). Could anyone truly believe the optimum way to learn and retrain during a lifetime is by going to a building and taking notes for 3 years, with a peer age group?

But when it comes to law, there is possibly the greatest gap of all between what is done just as it always was, and the faintest chance of what might be a desired outcome.

Having any proposals, discussions and decisions on anything cannot sensibly be done best by completely excluding the public's input. Perhaps only a few people have specialist knowledge or experience. The public need to be are able to initiate first ideas, or to add a fact which would leap-frog them, drastically revise them, or warn of bear-traps, right from back-of-envelope stage.

Hungary was interesting, because they were creating a 'new' country, so designed all systems anew, first deciding the aim, then the means. They were in a hurry, so later adapted as they considered best practice, or became aware of shortcomings, in their first draft of how to run a country.

Certainly a politician, civil servant, senior lawyer, or police officer is unlikely to have the faintest comprehension of being totally helpless and in the power of someone who can and may kill them and even get away with it. The nearest their imaginations might go is contemplating if they would themselves confidently go ahead and do something Putin would want them killed for, just after the Salisbury incident.

Maybe not? Then maybe they could glimpse how much less would an abused child or woman 'tell' on someone who in all their experience has been malevolent, life threatening, and will almost certainly twist any situation to make ostensible 'rescuers' and their tick-box 'help' a threat, enraging the abuser even more, and make the powerlessness even more total.

The objective of the powerless, too, is nothing to do with the objective of a legal steamroller. Breaking the wing mirror of an important man might result in a prison sentence equal to that for breaking the back of your wife or child. There's a fat cost to the tax-purse, for locking you up, and for all the court procedures. In prison you merely learn from fellow villains better tricks to get away with the same offences.

If the wealthy man gave evidence against you, you may want to punish him, but he will be hard to reach. If it was your wife or child, though, they will not doubt you will ensure they are punished more than you are, for their own offence, of reporting you.

A social work lecturer told her class "statistically, two in this hall joined the profession only in order to abuse children" Men in uniform, lawyers and doctors feature high on the tables of wife-abusers, so wherever women turn, nobody is truly trustworthy to be on their side.

[bluedomino]

You have to report it to their force. What do you do if the Domestic Abuse Officer is their friend? How can you speak freely, in the knowledge it will be passed on to him? It's in the forces interest to make no case to answer for, as if there is a case then they would have to deal with an officer and have questions asked about the moral standards of their officers. Plus they lose a member of staff. Its better for them to "make" it go away.

Who guards the Guards?

They are a law unto themselves.

If you want to find a racist, sexist, misogynistic homophobe, speak to a male police officer. They are the worst of people. I think after about 7 years they should cease to be police as after about 5 years they lose all integrity. They are corrupt. I wouldn't feel safe reporting any crime now.

[EmpressCixi]

That’s very concerning. It’s a red flag that warrants investigation. As pp pointed out, the fact someone has been accused doesn’t mean they are guilty. So it’s hard to tell if we are looking at a mountain or a molehill and anecdotes don’t cut the mustard.

I do agree that the officers own colleagues doing the investigation is a conflict of interest. There should be a central U.K. office hotline you report the DV accusation to if a partner or family member. They would then hand off the report and investigation to a different force. As in they should have a detective from say, the Fife constabulary investigating an accusation against a member of the Ayrshire constabulary for example. It wouldn’t cost much to pay for the detective to travel and stay in the area to do the investigation.

[bjjgirl]

Ok the stats are awful, I agree.

However, anyone can throw an accusation and make a complaint, a historic allegation can be impossible to prove to disprove if there is no evidence.

I know a lot of female police officers who were victims of dv whose partners used the threat of malicious allegation as a way of keeping them in the relationship. Although this would not be the majority of incidents in my opinion.

[MrMrsJones]

Obviously I believe in DV, I was a victim from my first husband.

I don't believe the stats are accurate, they need a bit of drilling down

[FrancescaContini]

@MrMrsJones

Obviously I believe in DV, I was a victim from my first husband.

I don't believe the stats are accurate, they need a bit of drilling down

It doesn't really matter what you "believe" though, does it?

[MrMrsJones]

But it's not accurate

It's people who have been reported for DV, not convicted.

Many people come into custody as innocent people, they may have a report against them, but when the investigation is concluded they are proven innocent.

So I would.like to see how many were actually charged or received a caution for the offence.