Watchdog probes how force handled child image cases
APOLICE watchdog is investigating possible failings by North Wales Police over its handling of intelligence relating to images of naked children.
The Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) has now outlined the scope of its investigation, adding any incidents of failures in dealing with information relating to the safeguarding of children would be of “major concern” to the community.
In November 2013, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) — now part of the National Crime Agency — sent North Wales Police a spreadsheet containing details of 12 people who were named by Canadabased Project Spade, that sought to identify the buyers of videos containing images of naked children.
All 12 were dealt with at the time by North Wales Police or other appropri- ate forces.
Then in October 2014, when the region’s force was collating information to return to CEOP, the original raw intelligence was checked again, and three additional names were discovered.
These have also now been subject to investigation by North Wales Police.
The force referred this incident after the IPCC wrote to all chief constables in the country asking them to look at how they had handled information originating from Project Spade.
North Wales Police identified a potential conduct issue for a civilian member of staff.
The IPCC investigation will look at:
Whether North Wales Police followed any forcewide or national policies and guidelines in their handling of the intelligence data.
Whether North Wales Police took sufficient action on the intelligence received and updated the NCA/CEOP appropriately about their actions.
Who within North Wales Police had ownership of the information and who was responsible for supervising that person.
What steps North Wales Police have already taken to prevent any recurrence of this issue.
The IPCC Commissioner for Wales, Jan Williams, said: “Any incidents of failures in dealing with intelligence relating to the safeguarding of children are naturally of major concern to the community.
“The IPCC will be undertaking an investigation to discover whether any failures occurred in the manner North Wales Police dealt with the information they received.”
The IPCC is not investigating any actions taken by North Wales Police in respect of any of the suspects named in the intelligence.