Policing - new material (69)
01 August 2004
Report of the MPA Scrutiny on MPS Stop and Search Practice. Metropolitan Police Authority (May) 2004, pp149. This report finds that the practice of stop and search is "influenced by racial bias" and that black people are four times more likely to be stopped than white people. Policing Minister, Hazel Blears, has acknowledged the "disproportionality" of the figures on stops and searches, but denies that the causes have anything to do with racism. Available on the MPA website, http:\\www.mpa.gov.uk/default.htm
Hi-tech moves, Lisa Bratby.
Police Review 30.4.04, pp23-23. Article on hi-tech crime, specifically computer crime, and the field of computer forensics. It considers the UK's National Hi-Tech Crime Unit (NHTCU), launched last April, and the Council of Europe's Cybercrime Convention. The head of the NHTCU, Detective Inspector Marc Kirby, stresses that it "is important to develop links with computer forensic experts in foreign law-enforcement agencies" and the Central Police Training and Development Authority (Centrex) recently secured European Commission funding "to develop cybercrime training for all 28 EU and candidate countries as well as Norway, Switzerland, Interpol and Europol."
A formal investigation of the police services in England and Wales: An Interim report, David Calvert-Smith.
Commission for Racial Equality (June) 2004, pp.77, ISBN 1 85442 551 X. This CRE investigation was launched after the BBC's Secret Policeman television programme revealed widespread racism among recruits at a police training school. It examines screening job applicants, training and disciplinary and grievance procedures and Employment Tribunal Cases. It concludes that little has changed in the five years since the publication of the Stephen Lawrence inquiry.
Policing: Modernising police powers to meet community needs. Home Office (August) 2004, pp. 28. Among the "modernising" powers discussed in this paper are the modification of the concept of arrest, search warrants, workforce modernisation, prevention and detection powers, identification (incorporating moving images, photographs, fingerprinting and "covert DNA and fingerprints") and the forfeiture of electronic devices relating to indecent photographs of children. See Home Office website
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/<