Abstract
This paper sets out to critically explore the connections drawn by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services between police adherence to national crime recording standards and the provision of service and support by the police to victims of crime. The goal of the paper is to identify what assumptions are being made by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services concerning how and why ‘accurate’ crime recording impacts upon victims and to test those assumptions against the broader victimological literature. In so doing, the paper will also shed light on the progress made by police services in this regard since significant concerns were raised about the impact of ‘poor’ crime recording on victims of crime by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary in its 2014 report Crime-recording: Making the victim count.
Keywords
Introduction
This paper sets out to critically explore the connections drawn by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS 1 ) between police adherence to national crime recording standards and the provision of service and support by the police to victims of crime. The goal of the paper is to identify what assumptions are being made by HMICFRS concerning how and why ‘accurate’ crime recording impacts upon victims and to test those assumptions against the broader victimological literature. In so doing, the paper will also shed light on the progress made by police services in this regard since significant concerns were raised about the impact of ‘poor’ crime recording on victims of crime in the report Crime-recording: Making the victim count by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC, 2014). 2
The study described here originally derived from work conducted by the author with Lincolnshire Police after it received a rating of ‘Inadequate’ following an inspection by HMICFRS of its crime recording practices carried out in the spring of 2018. In the aftermath of that inspection, the force and the Inspectorate each expressed very different views concerning the appropriateness of some crime recording rules and their potential impact on victims. Significantly, both organisations claimed that their respective approach put victims ‘at the heart’ of decision making. In the report compiled by HMICFRS after that inspection, it was clear that the Inspectorate was placing heavy emphasis on what it viewed as the negative impact of ‘poor’ crime recording decisions on victims themselves, as in the following extract: Lincolnshire Police officers and staff too often fail to make correct crime-recording decisions at the first opportunity. This is due to deficiencies in the force’s crime-recording processes, insufficient understanding of crime-recording requirements and limited supervision to correct the decisions of officers and staff and improve standards from the outset. This means the force is letting down many victims of crime. (HMICFRS, Lincolnshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, July 2018
3
)
In the next section this paper will proceed to set out some of the features of crime recording systems in England and Wales and the connections that have been drawn between these and victims of crime by victimologists. From there the paper will discuss the background to the specific research project set out here and the key research questions to be explored, which are:
In what ways does HMICFRS equate ‘good’ crime recording with ‘good’ service provision to victims of crime?
What links are being made to victims’ satisfaction with the police (and the wider criminal justice system)?
Are those links so drawn comparable or compatible with those suggested by the wider body of victimological research?
In setting out to answer these questions, the paper will next discuss the methodology and methods employed in this research, before going on to set out the key results obtained. A discussion will follow in which the findings are compared with existing victimological literature with a view to answering the research questions and, finally, conclusions will be drawn.
Victims, police and crime recording
Connections have long been drawn within the victimological literature between the recording of crime by police, the treatment of victims by officers, and victims’ wider experience with, as well as their perceptions of, the criminal justice system as a whole (Laxminarayan et al., 2013). Traditionally, police forces in England and Wales, as in many other parts of the world, have enjoyed considerable discretion over how they react to the crimes reported to them by the public (Myhill and Johnson, 2016). Options range from conducting a full investigation, with a view to establishing charges, to less formal resolutions (see Wortley, 2003). At the latter end of this spectrum lies the option of police officers, at their discretion, dismissing a reported incident as a ‘non-crime’ (Lea et al., 2003).
Although rules have existed in England and Wales since the 1920s mandating both the recording of certain crimes by the police and their notifying the government of specific offences (Newburn, 2007), criticism of police practices in this regard by criminologists and others developed throughout the 1980s and 1990s. Such criticism expanded markedly after the publication of the first large-scale crime surveys (Jansson, 2007) 4 with which police recorded crime could be readily compared. Analysis of successive runs of the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) subsequently revealed the extent of the so-called ‘dark figure’ of crime which was apparently being missed, ignored or disregarded by the police (MacDonald, 2002; Stevens, 2007). The picture of crime generated by police records was thus increasingly said to be inconsistent, missing many offences and reflecting a widespread dismissal of victims’ perspectives (see Tarling and Morris, 2010). Critical criminologists, and particularly feminist criminologists, emphasised that certain forms of victimisation, and notably certain forms of victim, were being repeatedly dismissed by police. Indeed, in a wider sense it was such revelations that lead to a shift in the focus of victimology away from its positivist roots towards becoming a subdiscipline concerned with victims’ lived experience and their treatment by the criminal justice system as a whole (see McGarry and Walklate, 2015). As such, the ‘no-criming’ of certain offence types has been widely explored by the victimological literature: most prominently in the areas of domestic abuse and sexual crime. As a consequence, significant research evidence has developed which highlights the traditional lack of belief by police of victims alleging rape or other sexual assault (Payne, 2009) especially when perpetrated within existing personal, family or intimate relationships (Hickman and Simpson, 2003).
The full range of such concerns, along with a detailed history of crime recording in England and Wales, could fill many pages. For present purposes this discussion will instead focus on the present regime of crime recording in operation in England and Wales. This is most frequently dated back to 1998 and the introduction of the Home Office Counting Rules (HOCR) for recorded crime, followed in 2002 by the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standards (NCRS). These two documents are often referred to concurrently, although strictly speaking the NCRS is a constituent of the HOCR, being described as ‘central to the HOCR’ in the most recent Home Office guide to the crime recording regime (Home Office, 2019: 3). Both instruments were produced in the context of the growing criticisms of inconsistent recording practices discussed above. As such, the intention of the overall regime is to standardise between police areas’ crime recording practices, including the processes by which the types and quantities of crimes to be recorded are determined. Specifically, the HOCR are concerned with the number of crimes to be recorded in a given situation, whereas the NCRS has the broader remit of ensuring consistency of approach in relation to the conversion of reports from members of the public to official crime records, as noted in the Home Office guidance notes: NCRS has twin aims of being victim focussed and maintaining consistency of recording across all forces. It is based on applying legal definitions of crime to victim’s reports. HOCR stipulate what type and how many offences in any particular incident should be recorded by police and notified to the Home Office. (Home Office, 2018a: 1)
The reference here to ‘believing’ victims represents one of the key tensions police forces have been obliged to grapple with since the growth of the victims’ movement: the question of whether it is appropriate for them, as ostensibly neutral investigators, to proceed on the basis that they ‘believe’ every person who reports having been a victim of crime. Such tensions were ultimately laid bare in a pivotal report from HMIC (2014) entitled Crime-recording: Making the victim count (hereafter Making the victim count). This report raised particular concerns regarding the handling by police forces of rape cases: The position in the case of rape and other sexual offences is a matter of especially serious concern. The inspection found 37 cases of rape which were not recorded as crimes. The national rate of under-recording of sexual offences (including rapes) as crimes was 26 per cent, and the national rate of incorrect decisions to no-crime rapes was 20 per cent. In the case of rape no-crime decisions, in 22 per cent of cases there was no evidence that the police informed the complainant of their decision. These are wholly unacceptable failings. (HMIC, 2014: 19) The presumption that the victim should always be believed should be institutionalised. The practice of some forces of investigating first and recording later should be abandoned immediately. The present latitude of allowing up to 72 hours before a crime is recorded should be abolished. (HMIC, 2014: 21)
Making the victim count therefore represented an escalation of the prominence of the victim when it came to crime recording. The report concluded that under-recording of crime (at 19%) was almost one in five and proceeded to equate this and similar findings with a failure by the police to adequately address the needs of victims of crime: Victims of crime are being let down…The problem is greatest for victims of violence against the person and sexual offences, where the under-recording rates are 33 percent and 26 percent respectively. This failure to record such a significant proportion of reported crime is wholly unacceptable. (HMIC, 2014: 49) Looking back over the last ten years, during which time the Home Office Counting Rules have remained largely unchanged, some broad trends emerge. For the first few years after the introduction of the NCRS (in 2002), crime-recording by police officers reached a high-water mark, with about 90 percent of victims’ reports of crime to the BCS being recorded by police officers. The low point was reached in 2012/13, when police records showed a shortfall of around 30 percent compared with victims’ reports to the crime survey. (HMIC, 2014: 53)
Making the victim count made a number of recommendations for improving crime recording and reforming both the HOCR and the NCRS, many of which were subsequently adopted into the crime recording regime. These recommendations included making it a requirement ‘that in cases where a no-crime decision has been made, the victim must always be informed in a timely manner and a record to that effect should be made’ (HMIC, 2014: 68). Of marked significance was the further recommendation that police forces should immediately ensure ‘the presumption that the victim should always be believed is institutionalised’. The overall vision for the HOCR and NCRS was also revised following the 2014 report to include both victims of crime and the promotion of public trust, as follows: (A)ll police forces in England and Wales (must) have the best crime recording system in the world: one that is consistently applied; delivers accurate statistics that are trusted by the public and puts the needs of victims at its core. (Home Office, 2019: 2)
Of particular interest for the present research, the Making the victim count report also contains a short section in which it purports to elaborate specifically on ‘why crime recording matters to victims’ (HMIC, 2014: 52). Examining that section in fact offers few concrete details. Instead, this section relies more on speculations such as ‘the fact many victims of crime do not appear in the crime statistics and many offenders are also missed…must seem surprising to the average citizen’ (52–53).
This section of the report also argues that ‘poor crime-recording has played a part in recent scandals, from the Jimmy Savile case to the sexual abuse of young girls in and around Rotherham’ (HMIC, 2014: 52). Finally, the section elaborates on what the report calls ‘unequivocal findings’ drawn from public opinion surveys carried out during the inspections that ‘97% of respondents said that it is important that all crimes reported to the police are recorded accurately. Only 66 percent, however, trusted the police to do so’ (53).
In reflecting on this section of the 2014 report it is clear that its discussion seems to focus more on why the public in general might hold the accurate recording of crime as a significant concern rather than victims of crime specifically. Nevertheless, following the publication of Making the victim count and the subsequent revisions to the Home Office crime recording regime based on its findings, HMIC initiated a new rolling programme of ‘crime data integrity inspections’ intended to assess the progress made against the report’s 13 recommendations, including those specifically targeting victims of crime.
The new programme of inspections commenced in August 2016 and at the time the data were collected for the present research (August 2019) this had been ongoing for just under three years. Under the programme, police forces are each inspected in turn and HMICFRS then produces a public report listing various areas of improvement that the force could make in its approach to crime recording. Where serious shortcomings have been identified, a report will also contain lists of causes of concern and recommendations linked to those causes of concern, which the force is expected to address by any subsequent inspection. Re-inspections are mandatory where a force is rated as ‘Inadequate’ overall.
The 2018 report in which Lincolnshire Police was rated as ‘Inadequate’, as noted above, resulted from one such inspection. As will be demonstrated through the analysis presented in this paper, this report, along with all others produced thus far from the present series of inspections, would draw heavily on the victim as a key focus of good crime recording practice. As such, through detailed analysis of these reports, we may begin to paint a more comprehensive picture of how HMICFRS sees crime recording practices as directly and indirectly impacting on the provision of services to victims by the police, along with any impact this is believed to exert on victims’ impressions of police and the wider criminal justice system. It is this exercise which will form the key contribution of the present paper. Although the dataset is drawn from a specific inspection programme of police forces in England and Wales, the findings produced here can inform thinking about the connections between crime recording and victim care in general, and in other criminal justice systems.
Background to the present research
The research set out below came about as a result of the author’s commissioning by the Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) of Lincolnshire to sit on a specially constituted independent panel tasked with investigating and monitoring the response of Lincolnshire Police to the July 2018 inspection report from HMICFRS described above. In judging the force to be ‘Inadequate’ in terms of its approach to crime recording, the Inspectorate’s summary noted: Based on the findings of our examination of crime reports…we estimate that the force fails to record over 9,400 reported crimes each year. This represents a recording rate of 81.2 percent…This means that on too many occasions, the force is failing victims of crime. (HMICFRS, Lincolnshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, July 2018)
The independent panel was commissioned by the PCC with a remit to ‘independently look at the context of the HMICFRS Crime Data Integrity inspection findings, the way the information was disseminated to the Public, the Force’s response to the Inspection findings and the impact both the Inspection and the response had on victims’ (Lincolnshire PCC Independent Crime Recording Panel, 2019: 5) and the response of Lincolnshire Police to the inspection, with a view to helping that force prepare for the required re-inspection. The present paper is not directly focused on the substantive work of the panel or its outcomes, but is rather concerned with the genuine disconnect, revealed through the panel’s work, between the picture painted by the Inspectorate’s report of a force seriously disregarding the views and perspectives of victims of crime and the panel’s own findings that chief officers, control room officers and the crime registrar for Lincolnshire were all in fact highly committed to delivering excellent service to victims (Lincolnshire PCC Independent Crime Recording Panel, 2019). Indeed, contrary to assumptions made by HMICFRS concerning the connection between victim satisfaction and adherence to the Home Office crime recording regime, Lincolnshire Police had initiated recording policies in opposition to these documents precisely with the goal of serving victims better. Most notably, this took the form of Lincolnshire’s choice not to apply the so-called ‘N100’ incident classification for cases of reported rape in the region (to be discussed below).
Such an apparent disconnect between an operating police force ‘on the ground’ and formal Home Office rules purporting to set out the most victim-focused way of recording crime raised important issues concerning the assumptions being made and/or the links being drawn by HMICFRS between crime recording practices and victim care. To shed light on these issues, this paper therefore reports on a systematic review of all the reports produced by the Inspectorate to date in its post-2014 programme of crime integrity inspections. Specifically, this review focused on how victims of crime figure in these reports and the connections drawn with crime recording.
The key research questions under consideration here are: in what ways does HMICFRS equate ‘good’ crime recording with ‘good’ service provision to victims of crime, what links are being made to victims’ satisfaction with the police (and the wider criminal justice system) and are those links so drawn comparable or compatible with those suggested by the wider body of victimological research? Significantly, this research is not seeking to produce a meta-analysis or evaluation of police forces themselves (either individually or collectively) in terms of whether they are meeting victims’ needs through crime recording practices, although the judgements made by the Inspectorate teams in this regard will inevitably figure prominently in this discussion. The goal is rather to critically interrogate the connections being drawn by HMICFRS between the Home Office crime recording regime and impacts on victims of crime, rather than police’s adherence to those standards per se.
Methodology
This research was based on a qualitative content analysis of the 45 reports published by HMICRS following all crime data integrity inspections carried out since the start of the present inspection programme in August 2016 (with Sussex Police) up until the most recent report at the time of data collection (published in July 2019, the City of London Police). This included eight reports of re-inspections carried out as a result of forces receiving an ‘Inadequate’ rating in their first inspection. 5 The reports are publicly available through the HMICFRS website and for the purposes of this research they were all loaded into the NVivo qualitative data analysis package. The reports were then subject to an initial keyword search for mentions of ‘victim’ and/or ‘victims’.
In total, the 45 reports come to 399 A4 pages of text in which a ‘victim’ or ‘victims’ are mentioned some 1,329 times, at an average of 50 mentions per report, each report running to 8 or 9 pages. With such a high frequency of occurrences, it was clear from this initial stage that a more targeted method would be required to extract the most relevant data. The reports themselves follow a largely standardised format, with occasional minor variations to take account of particular features of specific forces. As such, in order to provide a more structured and manageable dataset it was decided to focus on how victims were referred to (and to what ends) within several recurring sections. These were: - Overall judgement - Summary of findings - Causes of concern (when these existed) - Recommendations (associated in each report with any causes of concern listed in that section) - Areas for improvement - Discussion on the N100 classification for reports of rape - Force adherence to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime - Conclusion
Once again, a simple keyword search was conducted within each of these specific sections in all 45 reports for mentions of a ‘victim’ or ‘victims’. These occurrences were then each individually reviewed and the relevant surrounding paragraphs and sections, which gave context to the occurrence, were extracted for analysis. Having thereby reviewed, extracted and thematically coded all mention of victim/s in each of the identified sections across all the reports, those themes were then used to inform additional keyword searches, this time applied across the full text of all the reports. In this way, relevant data outside the confines of the specific sections listed above were gathered and further themes were generated. The process was repeated several times until theoretical saturation had been achieved. As such, whilst broadly constituting a simple qualitative content analysis, the methodology employed here also borrowed from more ethnographic content approaches, whereby there was a degree of movement back and forth between conceptualisation, data collection, analysis and interpretation (Krippendorff, 2018).
A quick note should be made here concerning the use of language in these reports, which to some extent will be adopted (as a matter of convenience) in this paper. Many of the reports refer to ‘shortcomings’ or ‘failures’ in the crime recording practices of police forces, or otherwise describe such processes as ‘poor’ or ‘inaccurate’. Conversely, most of the reports also compliment forces for other aspects of ‘good’ or ‘excellent’ practice identified. It is to be recognised that such judgements are made by HMICFRS in relation to a force’s apparent compliance with the HOCR and the NCRS. Nevertheless, at the heart of this paper lies the contention that the ‘proper’ or ‘best’ ways of counting and recording crime, including the best ways to do so for victims, are heavily contested and to varying degrees may represent value judgements. This will be reflected in the discussion below, where one of the key goals will be to problematise the assumptions made by the Inspectorate about the Home Office regime being ‘best’ for victims. In this sense, the paper takes a constructivist view of ‘good’ crime recording as a concept. This approach stems in particular from the observation that in Lincolnshire it was clear that officers believed they were in fact recording some kinds of crime well and giving victims the service they deserved irrespective of their departure from what the HOCR and NCRS required.
Results
The results of the analysis described above are organised and presented here in six overarching thematic groups. These are: failure of victims; under-recorded crime types and vulnerable victims; the recording of rape and ‘so-called reported incidents of rape’ (N100); adherence to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime; recording processes and auditing capacity; and force leadership and culture.
Failures in recording commensurate with failures for victims
The most consistent and pervasive theme running throughout the reports reviewed for this project is that all draw a very explicit link between ‘good’ crime recording, in exact accordance with HOCR and NCRS, and favourable service provision for victims of crime. Conversely, all reports which highlight both significant and less significant gaps between a force’s crime recording practices and the Home Office regime make explicit reference to this leading to failures for victims. Typical statements to this effect include the following: The force is not always recording reported violent crimes, sexual offences and crimes reported to its public protection investigation units (PPIUs). This means that the force is failing victims of crime too frequently. (HMICFRS, Greater Manchester Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, August 2017) The force is still failing some victims of crime. It needs to address this by ensuring that its staff and officers fully understand the crime-recording standards expected of them, and that these standards are supervised effectively. (HMICFRS, Wilshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, September 2017)
Although some inspection reports do therefore express concerns that direct harm may come to victims as a result of poor crime recording, much more frequently the emphasis is on asserted links between a failure to abide by published standards and the consequent impact this has on victims’ access to support services: including those provided by the police themselves and the wider suite of services commissioned by local Police and Crime Commissioners (see Hall, 2018). The following extract from the 2017 report into the Lancashire Constabulary makes this clear: ‘The delays we found in the recording of some reports of crime together with the failure to record a high number of reported crimes means that referrals to Lancashire Victim Services are either delayed or not made at all’ (HMICFRS, Lancashire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, November 2017).
In other police areas, where crimes were accurately recorded but such recording was subject to delays, 6 such delays are regarded as equally unacceptable by HMICFRS given the time-sensitive needs of some vulnerable victims in particular: ‘late recording of reported crimes is leading to delays in referring victims to relevant support services, letting down some of those victims who need the early support that this service can provide’ (HMICFRS, Bedfordshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, August 2018).
By contrast, the same report argues that a key benefit of recording crimes both accurately and immediately following their initial reporting is that ‘victims receive quicker access to services provided by the police and crime commissioner’s and the force’s victim care service’.
Certainly, the majority of the inspection reports under review emphasise that most referrals to victim service providers in local areas come from the police and that this in turn follows a timely and accurate record being made of reported crime(s). Typical examples include this extract from the 2017 report into the Cambridgeshire Constabulary, in its section on that force’s adherence to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime: ‘The constabulary has a victim hub which is funded by the police and crime commissioner. While some victims can refer themselves to the hub the majority of referrals come when a crime is recorded on the constabulary’s crime system’ (HMIC, Cambridgeshire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, June 2017).
Such processes and their links to crime recording are more specifically described in the 2018 report on Nottinghamshire Police, which also draws distinctions between the automatic referral of the majority of victims to relevant services
7
and the opt-in procedure of referrals for certain explicit forms of crime: All victims of crime whose reports are recorded by Nottinghamshire Police are automatically referred to Victim Support within two days, unless they opt out of the service. The exceptions to this are victims of domestic violence or sexual offences; in these cases, they are required to give their consent to a referral to Victim Support or other relevant organisations. Victims will then be contacted to discuss what support is available to them. Therefore, the recording of reported crime is important to ensure victims are not denied access to these services. (HMICFRS, Nottinghamshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, October 2018)
In the 2017 report into Durham Constabulary, poor crime recording is similarly linked with a risk that victims will lose confidence ‘that their report will be taken seriously’ (HMICFRS, Durham Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection, February 2018). The 2019 report on Gloucestershire Constabulary elaborates on such impacts on victim confidence, specifically linking this to the concern that repeat victims will not return to the police in the event of future victimisation, and indeed may even cease to support the criminal justice process in their present case: Failing to record such crimes, to give the victim appropriate support or to attend or investigate promptly will often cause the victim to lack confidence in the police. This can make the victim reluctant to engage in subsequent stages of the criminal justice system. (HMICFRS, Gloucestershire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2019, July 2019)
It was also clear from a number of the reports under review that victims of crime could still receive effective referrals to services notwithstanding police failure to accurately record crime, as was the case in Lancashire: The constabulary needs to act promptly to improve the accuracy of its recording of these reports. HMICFRS recognise that the victims of some of these reports still receive a service; however, the Constabulary needs to work to ensure all victims receive the service to which they are entitled and deserve. (HMICFRS, Lancashire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, November 2017)
Drawing on the language of ‘ethics’ in the context of crime recording practices reflects wider developments in UK policing over the last five years, whereby forces have become more concerned with questions of ‘ethical policing’. This focus has been supported by the College of Policing’s publication of a policing Code of Ethics in 2014, at around the same time as the release of the Making the victim count report. The Code of Ethics encompasses standards of ethical conduct for officers and lists ‘comply(ing) with the National Crime Recording Standard’ (College of Policing, 2014: 13) as one indicator of compliance with these. The Code of Ethics also includes a national decision-making model designed to ensure officers make ‘ethical decisions’ on questions of crime recording as well as a wide array of other choices made in the course of their duty.
Under-recorded crime types and vulnerable victims
In each of the inspections undertaken as part of the HMICFRS rolling programme under discussion in this paper, detailed sampling was conducted of specifically identified crime types which have historically been subject to under-recording. These crime types were: violent crime; sexual offences; rape; and modern slavery. The last of these crimes is the most recent to receive widespread and focused attention by police forces and is described in all 45 reports reviewed here as an important recent addition to the crimes that forces are required to investigate. In addition, it will be noted below that the under-recording of domestic abuse cases is highlighted in many of the reports, domestic abuse being defined here in accordance with the published Home Office (non-legal) definition. 8
A further sample was taken in each police area of crimes reported by so-called ‘vulnerable victims’. Vulnerable victims do not receive specific definition within the HOCR or NCRS and, perhaps as a consequence, no precise characterisation of this group appears in any of the Inspectorate reports reviewed for the present study. Given the commitment within the Home Office regime to adhere to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime, we might infer that the understanding of this group employed here is the same as that found in the Code. There, vulnerable victims are listed as including: children under the age of 18; any person suffering from a mental disorder; any person suffering from a learning disability; any person who is physically disabled; any witness whose evidence is likely to be diminished through fear or distress; and any victim of domestic or sexual abuse. 9 For its part, the Making the victim count report referred to vulnerable victims as encompassing ‘children, mentally ill and infirm people; these units may also have responsibilities for dealing with victims of sexual offences, including rape’ (HMIC, 2014: 13).
As noted above, many of the Inspectorate reports under review highlight particular deficiencies with the recording of crimes classified as ‘domestic abuse’, presenting this as a failure of vulnerable victims specifically: ‘Many of the unrecorded crimes of violence are cases of domestic abuse. This means that on too many occasions, the force is failing vulnerable victims of crime’ (HMICFRS, Derbyshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, March 2019).
The reports often go further to emphasise the development of greater knowledge amongst officers concerning the nature and scope of domestic abuse as an inherent outcome of good crime recording, thus: It is important that the force improves crime recording in domestic abuse incidents so that it has a greater understanding of how domestic abuse crime affects its communities, and victims can have greater confidence in the response of the force when reporting these crimes. (HMICFRS, Merseyside Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2018, April 2018)
Some forces were also commended for implementing systems of enhanced checks and scrutiny to ensure domestic abuse cases and other cases involving vulnerable victims as a whole had been recorded accurately, as noted in the report following the 2018 re-inspection of Leicestershire Police: (Leicestershire Police) introduced a process whereby designated decision makers (DDMs) review the previous 24 hours’ non-crime domestic abuse and vulnerable victim reports, rape reports and incidents opened as a sexual offence to check for unrecorded reports of crime As a result, substantially more victims will have their reported crimes recorded. These victims have received an improved service and been offered additional support from Victim Support. (HMICFRS, Leicestershire Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2018, January 2019)
In police areas where HMICFRS had identified what it viewed as significant deficiencies in recording practices in cases of domestic abuse, such problems were inevitably the subject of specific causes of concern and associated recommendations in the outcome reports. Hence, in the case of Hertfordshire Constabulary, the Inspectorate noted that the under-recording of such cases was ‘due to deficiencies in the constabulary’s crime-recording processes, insufficient understanding of crime-recording requirements, and limited supervision to correct the decisions of officers and staff and improve standards from the outset’ (HMICFRS, Hertfordshire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, November 2017). Domestic violence is also frequently highlighted in the causes for concern sections of the reports as an area in which police forces are failing victims of crime through slow, inaccurate or non-reporting of domestic abuse incidents as crimes.
For all the focus placed on the recording of domestic abuse cases in the reports under review, it is in fact the non-recording and under-recording of violent crime of a non-domestic nature which is most frequently cited as causing concern within the inspection reports reviewed for this project. A typical example is detailed in the 2018 report into Lincolnshire Police, where the authors note: ‘The recording rate for violent crime is a particular cause of concern at only 72.7 percent (with a confidence interval of +/- 3.30 percent). This means that on too many occasions, the force is failing victims of crime’ (HMICFRS, Lincolnshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, July 2018).
Indeed, even when the inspection reports note ‘progress’ in crime recording practices since 2014, many of them here adopt standardised wording emphasising that continuing to make such improvement ‘is particularly necessary in regard to the recording accuracy for victims of violent crime’.
Cases of sexual assault, along with the crime of rape, are similarly highlighted as being prone to under-recording across many police areas. Hence, in the Greater Manchester Police re-inspection report of 2018, the Inspectorate notes that ‘the force still has some work to do to improve the service it provides to victims of rape, domestic abuse and modern slavery’ (HMICFRS, Greater Manchester Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2018, April 2018). As has been noted already, modern slavery is highlighted in many of the reports as a significant new addition to the work of police forces, although here there were several examples across the inspections of good practice, with Lancashire Constabulary receiving particularly high praise for its recording practices in such cases: ‘The strong leadership and positive approach among officers and staff toward victims of crime is welcome, and we note the areas of good practice in regard to the cancellation of recorded crimes and the recording of reports of modern slavery’ (HMICFRS, Lancashire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, November 2017).
The impact of effective leadership from senior officers in bringing about positive changes in crime recording practices and victim care in general will be returned to later in this discussion.
In many cases, discussions of the specifically identified crime types are combined with more general observations about vulnerable victims as a whole. In many cases, forces were commended for progress made since 2014 in addressing the crime reported by (or on behalf of) such victims. These included Nottinghamshire Police, which had ‘provided crime-recording training for officers and staff who deal with vulnerable victims’ (Nottinghamshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, October 2018), and Avon and Somerset Constabulary which had ‘an effective process for providing victims who need an enhanced service with quick and appropriate access to support services to which they are entitled’ (HMIC, Avon and Somerset Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, February 2017).
The latter report goes on to describe how the Constabulary had ‘established (a) victim hub which provides all victims of recorded crime with access to support services to which they are entitled, and more intensive support for the most vulnerable victims’ (HMIC, Avon and Somerset Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, February 2017).
In other areas, forces were commended for working hard to identify the safeguarding needs of victims (notably Cumbria Constabulary and West Yorkshire Police).
The above positive comments and reports of progress notwithstanding, it became clear from the wider review of reports carried out for this research that crime recording in cases involving vulnerable victims generally – as well as victims of sexual offences, violent crime and domestic abuse specifically – are also frequently highlighted as areas in need of improvement within the causes of concern sections. These include calls to dramatically improve several forces’ capacity to audit the crime records for such cases: an issue that will be returned to later in this paper.
Recording of rape and ‘reported incidents of rape’ (N100)
In 2015 the NCRS was amended to introduce the N100 classification. N100 is explicitly not a record of crime but is rather a record of a reported incident of rape. As the standards make clear, ‘(a)ll reported incidents of rape must immediately, be either recorded as a confirmed crime or as an N100 record on the force crime system in keeping with HOCR guidance’ (Home Office, 2019: 11).
A N100 classification is therefore to be applied on the reporting of a rape incident, including the reporting of that incident by a third party, where there is not yet sufficient information or evidence to record a crime of rape. Effectively, the N100 regime is intended to prevent any reports of rapes going unrecorded, even if not all of these are later converted into a recorded crime of rape. As explained in the 2018 inspection report into West Yorkshire Police, (t)he N100 was introduced in April 2015. Its purpose is to explain why reported incidents of rape or attempted rape, whether they are reported by victims, witnesses or third parties, haven’t immediately been recorded as a confirmed crime. This can include instances where additional information confirms the rape didn’t take place, or where the rape took place in another force area and was transferred to the relevant force to record and investigate. (HMICFRS, West Yorkshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, May 2019)
Given the importance attributed to the N100 system as a tool for ensuring victims are believed, each of the HMICFRS inspections relevant to this study reviewed the use of the N100 incident classification by the police force under scrutiny. Notwithstanding the significance attributed to the scheme, the inspection reports reviewed for this research indicate widespread confusion amongst police officers across many forces as to the proper use of the N100 under the NCRS, as noted in the 2019 re-inspection report into Thames Valley Police: We found that frontline officers and staff still had very little awareness of the N100 classification. Again, this is disappointing as we highlighted this matter as an area for improvement following our 2017 inspection. The force has introduced a review process for N100 s. But more needs to be done to improve understanding among officers and staff to make sure it uses this classification correctly. (HMICFRS, Thames Valley Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2019, July 2019)
This issue of police misapplying the N100 code where reported rape incidents came from third-party professionals was also highlighted in the 2019 report following the re-inspection of Thames Valley Police. Here the police received criticism for having become less proficient as a force in its operation of the N100 regime since its 2017 original inspection: Also, since our last inspection the force has got worse at: using classification N100 for rape reports it decides not to record as crimes. In 2017, we found that the standard of N100 recording was exceptionally good. But in this audit, we found that there was general confusion in making these decisions. Staff in the contact management centre don’t understand whether or when to record a rape or a classification N100. (HMICFRS, Thames Valley Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2019, July 2019)
Other examples of FCRs and deputy FCRs taking such remedial action after the initial recording or non-recording of N100s were noted in connection with several forces. In Hampshire, the force had gone so far as to introduce its own completely unique recording code for reported incidents of rape, separate from those found in the Home Office guidelines. The inspection report into this force observed that this bespoke approach was ‘causing confusion and leading to incorrect crime-recording decisions and reported rapes not always being recorded when they should be’ (HMICFRS, Hampshire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, March 2019).
For some police forces, the inspection reports go further to raise concerns about what HMICFRS sees as the mishandling of rape reports, and in particular a concern that some rape victims are still facing an attitude of disbelief from officers: The force’s approach to recording rape reports and using classification N100 indicates that it doesn’t always accept the original report as presented by the victim when recording reports of rape. This is unacceptable, and the force must act immediately to stop this practice where it occurs. We also found there is still occasional misunderstanding of third-party reporting, use of N100s and the standard of additional verifiable information (AVI) required to cancel a crime. These issues are neither systemic nor widespread. (HMICFRS, West Midlands Police: Crime Data Integrity re-inspection 2018, January 2019) The remaining crimes were wrongly recorded as classification N100…This was due to a misunderstanding about the action to take when a professional third party or a victim with mental ill-health reports a crime. In the mental ill-health cases the officers took full details but, due to confusion and inconsistencies in the accounts given, wrongly believed that the classification N100 was appropriate. In fact a crime of rape should have been recorded from the outset. (HMICFRS, The Metropolitan Police Service: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, July 2018) The recording of offences of rape is of significant concern. The constabulary has insufficient specially trained officers to attend to victims of rape and also fails to correctly record reports of crimes of rape; these include reports received through the constabulary’s incident system, from investigations relating to modern slavery, from third party reports (for example, those reports received from health professionals) and from investigations involving vulnerable victims. (HMIC, Avon and Somerset Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, February 2017) We found the guidance provided by the force to officers and staff in respect of the use of classification N100 is wrong. For example, the guidance advises staff to record all reports of rape and, following investigation, request that the record be amended to classification N100 if it is established that a crime did not occur. This is incorrect; in fact, the classification N100 is only to be used in circumstances where a crime record is not created. (HMICFRS, Lincolnshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, July 2018)
Adherence to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime
Each inspection report (other than the eight reports following re-inspections) contains a section dedicated to assessing a force’s adherence to the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime. It is notable on this point that the Code itself does not explicitly mention the formal recording of crime as a process and, as such, the Code is largely brought into these inspections via the apparent connection detailed above between the proper recording of crime and victims’ access to services. Hence, in criticising the recording practices of Leicestershire Police, within this section the Inspectorate notes: (T)he delays we found in the recording of many reports of crime, together with the failure to record a high number of reported crimes means that referrals to Victim First are either delayed or not made at all. The improvements needed to address the under-recording of reports of crime, as discussed earlier in this report, will assist the force’s compliance in this area. (HMICFRS, Leicestershire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, September 2017) Connect Gwent offers its services to all crime victims whose reports are recorded by Gwent Police. It will then contact those victims who require support to discuss what support is available to them. Therefore, the recording of reported crime is important to make sure victims are not denied access to these services. (HMICFRS, Gwent Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, December 2018)
In all cases in which forces were judged not to be in compliance with the Code, the Inspectorate highlighted failures to provide victims with full information about the reporting/recording of crime, as in Northumbria: We also found that the force does not have a process to ensure that it provides all victims of crime with a written acknowledgement that they have reported a crime, including the basic details of the offence recorded. As this is compulsory under the code, this needs addressing. We note, however, that the force is considering a digitised solution which will involve either an automated email or text message to all victims of crime containing the necessary information. We encourage the force to make progress in this regard without delay. (HMIC, Northumbria Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, February 2017) We also found that the force does not have a process to ensure that it provides all victims of crime with a written acknowledgement that they have reported a crime, including the basic details of the offence recorded. As this is compulsory under the code, this requires improvement. (HMIC, Staffordshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, August 2016)
Force processes and auditing capacity
In many of its inspection reports, HMICFRS draws attention to what it views as deficiencies in the practical procedures and systems put in place (or not) for recording crime and providing information and other services to victims. For example, in the recurring report section entitled ‘Areas for Improvement’, many of the forces inspected (Derbyshire, Gloucestershire and Lancashire amongst others) are prompted to ‘put in place arrangements to improve the process for informing victims when their recorded crime has been cancelled’ (HMIC, Cheshire Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, June 2017).
Another issue raised in several Inspectorate reports in connection with that of vulnerable (but also other) victims is the proper recording of crime reported to police not directly by victims themselves but by various other parties. These can include the family, friends and neighbours of victims, but more frequently highlighted are cases where such reports come from support agencies and charities approached by the victim before (and sometimes as an alternative to) the police. In a number of areas police are criticised for failing to record the crimes reported by such third parties accurately, as in Sussex: ‘The force also needs to address shortcomings in its recording of crimes reported through non-incident routes, particularly those from third parties and which involve vulnerable victims’ (HMIC, Sussex Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, August 2016).
Many of the reports also emphasise, in connection with this issue, that forces are not doing enough to collect diversity information from victims of crime. In many cases the same forces are also judged not to be making effective use of such information to inform their compliance with equality duties (see, for example, HMICFRS, City of London Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2019, July 2019).
In several reports, forces are also criticised for using less formal diary appointment systems (whereby the public can book appointments to speak with officers several days in advance) to respond to reports of serious crime. In such cases the reports make clear that these systems should be used only for less serious crime, thus ensuring that ‘serious matters such as rape and domestic abuse are not resolved using this process, unless in exceptional circumstances in line with the victim’s wishes, and ensuring safeguarding needs are met’ (HMIC, Cambridgeshire Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, June 2017).
A need to devote resources to the proper auditing of crime records is another consistent theme running throughout many of the inspection reports under review, especially in relation to crimes reported by vulnerable victims. For example, in the 2017 report into Kent Police, failures in crime recording are explained by a breakdown of processes in the force control room coupled with limited audit and supervision capacity ‘to correct the decisions of officers and staff and improve standards from the outset’ (HMIC, Kent Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2017, June 2017). In this report the Inspectorate also expands on the observation that these problems were especially pertinent in cases where multiple crimes are reported by one or more victims.
As noted previously, many of the inspection reports highlight crime recording in cases involving ‘vulnerable victims’ generally, as well as victims of sexual offences, violent crime and domestic abuse specifically, as areas in need of improvement within their causes of concern sections. Often these denouncements are combined with the criticism that forces lack sufficiently robust or developed auditing processes to review crime records in such cases and thus ensure their accuracy. Hence, in Greater Manchester: The force is not always recording reported violent crimes, sexual offences and crimes reported to its public protection investigation units (PPIUs). This means that the force is failing victims of crime too frequently. The force is failing to adequately ensure that it records all reports of rape. The force’s recording, supervision and audit of reports of crime contained in its PPIUs’ records, and which often involve vulnerable adult and child victims, do not enable the force to record all crimes contained within these reports. (HMICFRS, Greater Manchester Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, August 2017)
Other reports emphasise the special need for such enhanced auditing capacity ‘where the risk to the victim of crime is greatest’ (HMIC, Devon and Cornwall Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2016, February 2017).
Force leadership and culture
From analysing the reports sampled for this research, three key sub-themes emerged which broadly relate to cultural attitudes within the police. These were: the attitudes of a force’s senior leadership; the need to ‘believe’ victims; and the rejection of a ‘target culture’. In the first case, the presence of effective, top-down ‘strong leadership’ from senior officers is highlighted as a positive feature of many of the forces inspected, often in a report’s conclusion section. Indeed, for several forces the example set by the senior leadership team was credited with instilling a genuine cultural shift within the force in favour of accurate crime recording and a positive approach to victim service in general. To take the example of the Cumbria Constabulary, the Inspectorate notes: The leadership has created a positive cultural change among officers and staff regarding the importance of crime recording. This has made sure that more victims receive the service they are entitled to and have access to support and safeguarding where required. (HMICFRS, Cumbria Constabulary: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, May 2019) We welcome its strong leadership and the positive approach among most officers and staff toward victims. However, the force needs to further improve its crime-recording processes. It should also make sure that its staff and officers fully understand the crime-recording standards expected of them, and that it supervises these standards effectively. (HMICFRS, Dyfed-Powys Police: Crime Data Integrity inspection 2018, December 2018)
Indeed, the formal recommendation that forces implement enhanced training for officers to ensure that, at the point of report, greater emphasis is placed on the initial account of victims is one of the most frequent, found across all the reports reviewed.
Finally, several of the crime integrity reports refer back to the ‘target culture’ amongst police forces which had been alluded to in Making the victim count. There, it will be recalled, it was suggested that crime was effectively being under-recorded in some police areas as a direct consequence of the drive to achieve numerical crime-reduction and detection targets on paper. On this issue it was notable that none of the reports reviewed for this project expressed any concern that crime recording was impacted by such interests in any given police area. Hence, in the case of Surrey Police the HMICFRS report notes: ‘we found a commitment to accurate crime recording that is victim-focused and free from performance pressures of any kind’ (HMICFRS, Surrey Police crime data integrity inspection 2018, October 2018).
In the case of Gwent Police, the issue was once again connected to the notion of ethical crime recording. That is to say, crime recording procedures that were ‘free from performance pressures of any kind’ are viewed as both more accurate and more ethically robust (HMICFRS, Gwent Police crime data integrity inspection 2018, December 2018). In several reports, HMICFRS employs identical phraseology to this effect in its conclusion section: ‘Staff were clear that they no longer felt under any pressure to minimise the number of crimes recorded because of performance targets’ (HMICFRS, Humberside Police crime data integrity inspection 2018, July 2018).
In this sense, then, the reports are all but unanimous in presenting a significant move forward in the way crime recording is handled across England and Wales.
Discussion
In examining the results set out above, those familiar with the background and literature surrounding the victims’ movement will find much that is recognisable. The fundamental proposition employed by HMICFRS is that poor or at least disappointing treatment by the police from the victim’s perspective (relative to whatever expectations they have been given) has a significant impact on victim satisfaction with and confidence in the police. Such effects have indeed been demonstrated both in academic commentary and through crime surveys (see Awan et al., 2019). It is, however, much less clear from the literature whether victims ascribe importance (directly or indirectly) to the accurate recording of crime in the technical sense used in these reports (i.e. full compliance with HMCR and NCRS). Of course, that victims do not explicitly cite the prompt, formal recording of crime in itself as an indicator of their satisfaction with police is perhaps to be expected: the average victim is likely to have little knowledge of the HOCR and NCRS. The question, then, is rather whether accurate crime recording, again in the sense used here, itself is contingent on achieving outcomes victims do find significant.
One of the first detailed examinations of victims in the criminal justice system was Maguire and Bennett’s (1982) study on burglary victims. Their findings indicated that the majority of victims were more concerned with the public relations or service provision of the police than their investigative role, albeit possibly because they could only judge police effectiveness by the former. Similar sentiments were echoed in Shapland et al.’s (1985) Victims in the Criminal Justice System, which demonstrated that victim satisfaction with the police dropped as cases progressed through a criminal justice process which failed to live up to their expectations.
The above basic themes have been repeated in the outcomes of many subsequent investigations into victim satisfaction with the police. In reviewing such work, Skogan (2006), for example, argued that (p)olice are judged by what physicians might call their ‘bedside manner’. Factors like how willing they are to listen to people’s stories and show concern for their plight are very important, as are their politeness, helpfulness and fairness. Rapid response has positive effects as well. (115)
More recently, Wedlock and Tapley (2016) conducted a rapid evidence assessment around the question of What works in supporting victims of crime on behalf of the UK Victims’ Commissioner. Their report again emphasises ‘timely and accurate information and effective methods of communication with victims, both in delivering information and listening to their needs’ (Wedlock and Tapley, 2016: 5) as key determinants both of victim satisfaction with the police and indeed the effectiveness of any support mechanisms aimed at victims. Other important factors in achieving such ends include the professionalism of victim services and the coordination of multi-agency support packages. The authors also emphasise that victims tend to value procedural justice over substantive outcomes.
Evidence from successive runs of the Crime Survey for England and Wales appear to support such conclusions. For example, multivariate analysis (logistic regression) carried out on the 2005/2006 British Crime Survey (as it was then called) carried out by Myhill and Beak (2008) found that the following factors were strongly associated with perceiving the local police to be doing a good or excellent job: believing that the local police are dealing with the things that matter to communities; thinking that the local police treat everyone fairly and with respect; thinking that the level of crime in the local area had stayed the same or decreased in the previous two years; and being very or fairly satisfied with the way the police handled the matter after initiating some form of contact with them.
Of course, crime survey data cannot assist directly in exposing what part the proper recording of crime might have on victim satisfaction with the police. The CSEW does not question respondents explicitly about this issue, although it does rate victim satisfaction against factors pertaining to a reported crime’s progress through the criminal justice system. These results have shown that victims’ satisfaction is most positively associated with issues such as: whether the victim feels they have been treated fairly and with respect by the police; whether an offender was charged; whether an offender went to court; and how well the police kept victims informed (see Office for National Statistics, 2019).
Reviewing the evidence, it is by way of summation tempting to refer back to the conclusion drawn by Skogan (2006) to capture the basic message of this body of work in the following terms: One consistent finding is that victims are less ‘outcome’-oriented than they are ‘process’-oriented—that is, they are less concerned about someone being caught or (in many instances) getting stolen property back, than they are in how promptly and responsibly they are treated by the authorities. (120)
It is therefore likely that HMICFRS is correct to work on an assumption that efficient recording of crime, as part of a robust and sympathetic police procedure, often does lead to victims receiving services more effectively and more quickly. Nevertheless, there is also plenty of evidence in the above findings to demonstrate that proper crime recording in no way guarantees this will be the case. Hence, we have seen instances captured in the reports where crimes were being recorded accurately and in full accordance with the Home Office regime but when victim referral to services was still markedly delayed. We have also seen cases where some victims in this position received no such referral at all. The Inspectorate has also highlighted police areas where victims were not being kept informed of the dropping of their cases, notwithstanding their initially being recorded accurately. The converse has also been true, where HMICFRS uncovered situations in which victims were referred to support services notwithstanding the failure of police to record crime in accordance with the Home Office regime.
More generally, it is worth observing that in most of the reports presented by HMICFRS in which police are criticised for failure to adopt proper crime recording practices, the forces in question still receive measures of praise for their sympathetic and understanding approach to victims. We see this reflected in the fact that almost all forces are judged to be aware of their responsibilities under the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime. Similarly, in the conclusion section of the majority of these reports, forces are praised for a pro-victim culture filtering down from leadership teams. Fundamentally, then, there is little concrete indication in the above findings that a failure to record crime (and certainly failure to comply with all prescribed technicalities) in itself greatly impacts on the general treatment of victims by the police in terms of the ‘bedside manner’ issues the research tells us are significant to them. In conclusion we might argue that the repeated assertion in many of the reports that failure to record crime in a way consistent with the Home Office regime has necessarily led to failures of victims is at best overstated and in some cases not readily apparent from the evidence reviewed.
In terms of the specific focus on various crime types demonstrated in these reports, it is clear that those crime types chosen, specifically violent crime and sexual crime, are indeed historically under-reported (see Tarling and Morris, 2010). The history of research into modern slavery is considerably more recent but the assumption that this too is a largely hidden, complex activity linked to organised crime groups is equally supported by studies in this area (Webb and Garciandia, 2019). Domestic abuse of course has a much longer history of attention from victimologists who have written widely round the mechanisms by which police traditionally ‘ignored’ and ‘no-crimed’ these cases, to the serious detriment and likely harm of victims themselves. Similarly, much of the victimological movement has been centred around the plight of so-called ‘vulnerable victims’ more generally: including the particular difficulties they have faced receiving due attention, support and respectful treatment from the criminal justice system (see Ellison, 2001). At the same time, the links drawn between these kinds of victims and low confidence in the criminal justice system are equally well supported by research evidence (Tapley, 2005): victims of violent crime in particular traditionally expressing lower satisfaction with and confidence in the police (Bradford and Myhill, 2015).
In short, the academic literature and past research into victims of crime broadly supports the identification of certain victim groups for extra scrutiny in terms of how they are treated by the police, as evidenced in the HMICFRS reports. Indeed, to build on this, given the observations made above that in some (and perhaps many) cases the timely and accurate recording of crime may indeed lead to more efficient service provision for victims, adherence to the Home Office regime may be said to facilitate an overall better service to these traditionally under-serviced groups as a whole. This may be particularly so when the specific crime type, if properly identified through a crime record, signals the need for extra support and services over and above the ‘standard’ offering to other victims of crime. Hence the Inspectorate reports highlight many cases in which forms of victimisation singled out above were connected with specialist service providers as a result of the crime being quickly and efficiently recorded in line with HOCR and NCRS.
Nevertheless, notwithstanding the foregoing points, the Inspectorate reports reviewed for this research do not paint a consistent picture in which the recording of crime in line with the Home Office regime is always the deciding factor in achieving the above aims for victims. Indeed, this review has highlighted many examples where the HMICFRS acknowledges this was not achieved. We might also problematise the link drawn by the Inspectorate between the recording of crime in cases of vulnerable and other specific victim groups and the greater understanding this is said to foster of how such crimes impact on the wider community. Very little indication is given in substance within the reports as to how this connection is made. Of course, it is clear that if police are taking such crimes ‘seriously’ (as victims say they want) it seems probable this will increase police knowledge along these lines. However, whilst the assumption that failure to adhere to strict recording standards may indicate such crimes are being routinely ‘ignored’ by the police, more often the reports speak of inaccuracies or delay in relevant crime recording rather than a culture of ‘no-criming’ such incidents. Again, the question to be drawn from this is whether adherence to the NCRS or HOCR is really the deciding, or even a key, factor within the wider response of police officers in such cases.
Regarding the emphasis placed on the N100 system of recording reported incidents of rape, we have already seen how this issue is strongly tied to the question of whether police should automatically proceed on the basis that they believe all victims from the outset when a crime is reported. Previous writing on police cultures has raised significant concerns about the way officers have traditionally approached some victims: with particular emphasis on their approaching rape complainants with presumptions of suspicion, disbelief and, sometimes, attitudes akin to victim blaming (Gracia et al., 2014). Although recently the relevant literature points to moves away from such practices in operational policing (see Oehme et al., 2016), police have continuously struggled with this issue – as have lawyers and the courts (Hall, 2009) – given that suspects are innocent until proven guilty and their duty is to investigate cases objectively. The perceived difficulty for these actors is that to institutionalise the language of ‘victimhood’ before any finding of guilt by a court could be construed as pre-judging the outcome. For this reason, many prosecutors and police have taken to referring to ‘complainants’ rather than ‘victims’, especially in rape cases (Hall, 2009).
In 2016, the Commissioner of the London Metropolitan Police Service (‘the Met’) wrote a piece expressing significant concern over moves to institutionalise a policy of believing all victims, especially in historic cases involving public figures (Hogan-Howe, 2016). Here the Commissioner noted the findings of Angiolini’s (2015) independent review of how the Met dealt with rape cases. That review argued that, contrary to a belief amongst many officers (which was also a source of aggravation amongst them), it was not police policy to automatically believe all complainants in rape cases at all stages of an investigation. Rather, police were being encouraged to adapt their views in the light of emerging evidence. Angiolini offered detailed suggestions as to how the police should deal with the practicalities of this which are worth replicating here in full: While complainants clearly want to be believed and may be deterred if they feel this does not happen, it is questionable whether a policy of institutionalized belief is appropriate. While demonstrating even the merest disbelief, cynicism or incredulity at victim’s account is entirely inappropriate the review questions whether requiring a police officer to believe is an instruction capable of being achieved. Rather than labelling this approach is belief, it is suggested that it is more appropriate for criminal justice practitioners to remain utterly professional at all times and to demonstrate respect, impartiality, empathy and an open mind. The review suggests that, in the first instance, officers should proceed on the basis that the allegation is truthful as proposed in the Special Notice of 2002. The alternative approach of ‘always believing’ the complaint may prejudice the impartiality of the officer’s roles and lead to their failing to recognise or give weight to other evidence inconsistent with the complainant’s account. (2015: 57)
Nevertheless, Angiolini’s report is couched in the term ‘complainant’. The matter was specifically addressed by a later independent review by retired High Court Judge Sir Richard Henriques (2016) in which he concluded: I have a clear and concluded view. All ‘complainants’ are not ‘victims’. Some complaints are false and thus those ‘complainants’ are not ‘victims’. Throughout the judicial process the word ‘complainant’ is deployed up to the moment of conviction where after a ‘complainant’ is properly referred to as a ‘victim’. Since the entire judicial process up to that point is engaged in determining whether or not a ‘complainant’ is indeed a victim, such an approach cannot be questioned. No Crown Court judge will permit a ‘complainant’ to be referred to as a ‘victim’ prior to conviction. Since the investigative process is similarly engaged in ascertaining facts which will, if proven, establish guilt, the use of the word ‘victim’ at the commencement of an investigation is simply inaccurate and should cease. (14) He argues that the police should start from a position where victims are not believed when they report a crime, and that the police should be impartial, so they can conduct unbiased investigations…He also argues that when such allegations are made, the person making the claims should be referred to as a ‘complainant’ and not as a ‘victim’…I believe that if these recommendations are accepted, the police will be taking a significant step backwards, undoing much of the progress made to give victims the confidence to come forward. (Newlove, 2016)
Expanding on the previous point, it is notable how even awareness and technical compliance with the Code of Practice for Victims of Crime within a force was not in all cases achieving what the Inspectorate considered the best outcomes for victims. Furthermore, the disconnect identified in so many of the reports between a culture shared amongst senior force leaders, which was fully behind the goal of providing high-quality victim care, and the practical reality on the ground reinforces previous indications that police cultures can vary significantly even within a single force (Ingram et al., 2018). In short, what the present research heavily implies is that there is no easy proxy for ‘good victim care’: whether that be knowledge of the Code, positive aspirations of top management or, indeed, full adherence to the HOCR and NCRS.
In making the above points, it is significant to note that the UK government’s policy on victims more broadly has shown signs of shifting towards a much more outcome-focused approach when it comes to assessing victim support services. This has been particularly the case in relation to the commissioning of local services for victims by Police and Crime Commissioners in England and Wales under a central Commissioning Framework (Ministry of Justice, 2013). As set out in the government’s consultation on the scheme: We believe that an outcomes based approach to commissioning services is a far more effective one than the current approach in which service providers’ performance is measured against factors such as how many victims they have contacted, or how many referrals they have received. This does not allow any assessment of how a service has supported a victim or the results of that support. (Ministry of Justice, 2012)
Of course, perhaps the more cynical interpretation of the Inspectorate’s approach is that this represents another example of the use of victims to lend support to a quite different set of policy goals. It has long been argued that many reforms made to criminal justice systems in the name of victim care can often be deconstructed and exposed as furthering very different aims and values (Elias, 1986). Sometimes these alternative aims seem to correspond with overtly political objectives (Rock, 2004). In other cases, such reform has been argued to support punitive criminal justice philosophies (Dignan, 2005). A further argument, frequently put forward by critical commentators, is that reforms to assist victims have had less to do with the needs of victims per se and much more to do with neo-liberal market philosophies and the quest for efficiency and cost-cutting in all criminal justice systems. On this point, Duggan and Heap (2014) argue that in the UK such polices have been heavily influenced (indeed, driven) by economic imperatives and a right-realist approach to expanding criminalisation and control. In addition, the case is made that austerity measures and the increased pertinence of social media have both served to catapult the victim still further into political consciousness. As the authors note: ‘the examples outlined in the above section demonstrate how increases in the politicization and administration of victimization are set in the context of a seemingly disgruntled and cash-strapped UK, where behavioural tolerance is being constantly redefined’ (Duggan and Heap, 2014: 55).
In short, Duggan and Heap conclude: ‘Current victim policy seeks to manage the victim experience in the CJS (criminal justice system) in line with the dominant political ideology underpinning current developments in criminal justice’ (2014: 35).
The lack of clarity, exposed through the present research, as to the exact link being drawn by HMICFRS between crime recording in line with the Home Office regime and ‘success’ or ‘failure’ on behalf of victims might therefore raise concerns that the goal here is in fact one of achieving systemic efficiencies rather than servicing the needs of victims themselves. Of course, in arguing this it should be acknowledged that, as we have seen already in this paper, police efficiency may well lead to better quality of service provision for victims in many cases. Nevertheless, the worry must be that, as Garland (2001) famously put it, using victims as a tool for buttressing confidence in, and thus effectiveness of, the criminal justice process ultimately contributes to a broader ‘culture of control’ permeating politics and public policy in late modernity. When such thoughts are applied directly to the recording (and therefore the formal labelling) of ‘crime’ as such by the police we may be rightly concerned that victims are once again being used as the ultimate justification for a more punitive approach.
Conclusions
The ongoing series of crime data integrity inspections by HMICFRS, along with the previous inspection programme leading up to the Making the victim count report, have cast significant light on what had been the largely obscured practices of police crime recording. From a victimological perspective it is pleasing to see HMICFRS apparently putting the victim issue at the heart of its assessment of crime recording processes, given that so much of the preceding literature in this area has raised significant concerns about the impact of issues like no-criming on victims themselves. Fundamentally, the assumption drawn by the Inspectorate that accurate crime recording impacts positively on victims’ experience of the police service, along with their access to wider service provision, may well prove accurate in the majority of cases. There is difficulty, however, with the broad-brush assertion that the failure of police to record crime in exact accordance with HOCR and NCRS necessarily implies a full-on ‘failure’ of victims, or indeed that ‘good’ recording will always lead to better results in this regard. In fact, we have seen evidence from the reports themselves which contradicts both positions. We have also seen that, notwithstanding the Home Office regime being championed as best practice, in fact there is still great contention within the independent police forces of England and Wales over what the best approach to crime recording might be, from a victims’ perspective and indeed more widely. This suggests the need for further research, especially given that crime surveys do not routinely ask victims to reflect on crime recording practices (or any direct proxy thereof) to ascertain exactly how different practices do impact on the victim’s experience and perceptions. Such research, of course, will necessitate the significant collection of views from victims themselves, in an outcome-orientated manner.
The more conceptual and perhaps deeper concern raised by this research is that in drawing such a stark and uncontextualised link between crime recording and victim care, HMICFRS is in fact betraying an alternative emphasis on efficiency within the system rather than the real and measurable impacts of both the NCRS and HOCRS on victims themselves. This leaves us with the question of whether victims are once again – as they have so many times before – being employed here as a convenient driver for a quite different set of policy goals, furthering a more streamlined and marketised version of the criminal justice system and, at worst, potentially expanding a culture of control.