Home Office Miscounting

I could not go any further with my blog without paying homage to the splendiferous Home Office Counting Rules. In recent years police forces have often been credited with "cooking the books" to keep the crime figures down, but the Home Office deserves some of the glory for this.

You see, police forces used to "benefit" from villains who on their last salute en route to prison decided to come clean and admit to a string of shopliftings, for example, all at the same store. So Mr Thief might break down in interview and say, "Yes yes I have stolen beer from Tesco every Monday for the last year, may God have mercy on my soul." Hey presto, the officer sits down for 5 hours, creates 52 crime reports and instantly claims credit for "detecting" them against Mr T's name. Tesco didn't even notice the beer was gone. The fact is, Mr T did all of these offences, he has admitted them all, but you couldn't have a police force claiming success in the numbers game due to one pathetic junkie who can't keep his mouth shut in interview.

Et voila! "The Finished Incident Rule":

Example: 'A' threatens 'B' on three occasions.
(i) 'B' reports the threats to the police on each occasion a threat is made.
Three crimes.
(ii) 'B' reports the occurrences at the same time.
One crime.

So the naughty naughty police force in the above example can only claim ONE detection, for one shoplifting consisting of 52 incidents. Good work, Home Office.

Here is another example, taken from my own experience:
A woman suffers a catalogue of abuse from a violent partner. In 2003 he headbutts her, knocking her unconscious, in January 2004 he punches her, in February kicks her, strangles her with a television cable in March. 2005 he throws her to the floor whilst 9 months pregnant and she miscarries. She is vulnerable, depressed, sees no way out, and does not call the police. Instead, she takes photos of her injuries each time and records the dates, knowing that one day she may need them. In 2006 following a screaming row, her partner grabs her round the throat and threatens to kill her. The camel's back breaks, she comes to the police and reports all of these incidents, armed with the evidence to prove them. The man is arrested and charged with three counts of GBH, 3 common assaults and a threats to kill.

This one man's reign of terror over his partner may well account for a tenth of all violent offences recorded in the police area that week, and yet all this is recorded as one crime. That will make society feel safe. Jolly good show, Home Office.

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