The police forces who ignore thousands of serious crime victims

POLICE are failing to record tens of thousands of crimes, including victims’ reports of rape and serious violence.

Almost 60,000 calls are being ignored every year by four forces, through either blunders or a lack of training for officers.

Shockingly, some police and staff dismiss reports of crime received from victims who they believe are suffering from mental health issues.

The scale of the problem is revealed today by Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC). The police watchdog said forces were routinely under-recording rape, sexual offences, attacks and modern slavery.

Inspectors raised concerns after scrutinising four forces previously rated ‘ inadequate’ for accuracy of crime recording – Merseyside, Northumbria, Devon and Cornwall, and Avon and Somerset. In total, they found a total of 57,600 offences were ignored by the constabularies or recorded as ‘no crimes’ – meaning victims were being denied justice.

The true figure will be much higher because there are 39 other forces in England and Wales. The watchdog carried out new inspections after discovering three years ago that 19 per cent of reported crimes were dismissed by constabularies across the country. That scandal led to the police being stripped of their statistics kitemark by the Office for National Statistics and led to a widespread shake-up of how forces dealt with reports of offences.

In its latest report, HMIC judged Merseyside Police as ‘inadequate’ again after finding it failed to record around one in six crimes reported to it.

It estimated the force was not recording 16 per cent of offences each year – more than 19,200 crimes. HM Inspector of Constabulary Mike Cunningham said: ‘Those failings are depriving many victims of the services to which they are entitled and are a cause of concern.

‘It was a cause of great concern that we found that even serious offences such as violent crime and sexual offences were not being recorded correctly. We also found examples of domestic abuse being under-recorded.’

Devon and Cornwall Police was also rated as ‘inadequate’, with the watchdog finding it recorded only 82 per cent of reported offences correctly. This means it is ignoring 17,400 reported crimes each year.

HM Inspector of Constabulary Wendy Williams said: ‘I was most concerned to find that the force had failed to record reports of rape, serious sexual assault and offences of serious assault and human trafficking.’

The Avon and Somerset and Northumbria forces were judged to be ‘requiring improvement’.

The four forces are the latest to come under scrutiny as part of rolling inspections looking at forces’ crime data ‘integrity’.

HMIC announced the programme in November 2015 after finding the national average of under-recording of crimes stood at an ‘inexcusably poor’ 19 per cent. At the time, inspectors found more than 800,000 crimes reported to police go unre- corded every year, including a quarter of sexual offences, with more than 200 rapes dismissed as ‘no crime’.

They also found that one in five offenders who escaped with a caution, warning or penalty notice should have faced a more severe punishment or been sent to court to face jail. Police had a ‘ target mentality on the front line’, the watchdog said.

Deputy Chief Constable Carl Foulkes, of Merseyside Police, said: ‘The force has worked hard to improve its crime recording, but the HMIC has identified some areas of concern and we acknowledge that when we get it wrong we need to hold our hands up and look at what went wrong, why it went wrong and how we can ensure that we learn from the mistakes made.’

Assistant Chief Constable Nikki Watson, of Avon and Somerset Police, said: ‘Since our last inspection we’ve made great strides in improving our crime recording accuracy, but there’s still more work to be done.’

In the year to September, police recorded 4.7million offences – a rise of 8 per cent, according to the Office for National Statistics.

A Home Office spokesman said: ‘ Police reform is working and crime traditionally measured by the Crime Survey of England and Wales has fallen by a third since 2010, making families and communities safer.

‘There has been progress across the country since 2014 with the Office for National Statistics clear that the rise in police recorded crime is largely down to improved recording practices and more victims having the confidence to come forward.

‘But it is vital for public confidence in policing that all crimes are taken seriously and recorded accurately and there is clearly more for some forces to do.

‘We would urge those concerned to carefully consider these findings and what more can be done to improve the recording of crime.’

‘We have to learn from our mistakes’