‘Lack of trust’ hampers gun crime investigations

Improved relations between the police and local communities are key to tackling the rise in gun crime, according to Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC).

The HMIC visited eight forces as part of a thematic inspection on the criminal use of firearms.

They praised officers of all ranks for their work, saying that individual policing initiatives were delivering ‘impressive results’ on the ground.

But the report said the successful deployment of armed officers was only a ‘partial’ solution to gun crime in this country.

“Creation of trust between the police and community is an essential pre-condition to long term success, and continued effort to this end is vital,” the report found.

Inspectors said the wall of silence often faced by the police during an investigation into this type of crime was “symptomatic of a fundamental lack of trust.”

Family liaison officers (FLOs) were also considered ‘crucial’ by inspectors to the investigation and failure to provide an FLO could have ‘disproportionate’ effect on the community.

In 2002/3 police attended 14,827 firearms incidents compared to 11,005 in 1998/9. The number of shots fired increased from 13 to 37 in that same period.

But despite the increases in incidents the report stressed that gun crime was still relatively rare and represents just half of one per cent of all recorded crime.

Tim Hollis, Assistant Inspector of Constabulary, said, “We do not believe that the police should be routinely armed. Of greater importance is the level of experience, training and knowledge of police officers and recognition of the fact that the deployment of armed officers is only a partial – albeit important – part of the solution

“Clearly the police service has a key role to play, but it will only be able to succeed in reducing gun crime if the community is on board and there is a close working relationship with both statutory and voluntary agencies.”

“We are encouraged to find that at the local level a number of forces had developed positive initiatives to combat gun crime but nationally there was need of greater co-ordination. ACPO and the Home Office have already taken steps to this end.”

Home Office Minister, Caroline Flint, said the active engagement of communities was ‘vital’ to tackling gun crime and praised the work of forces, in particular the Met.

“Specialist teams such as Operation Trident have shown that expertise gets results, not just in bringing criminals to justice but in challenging gun culture and actually preventing violence in the first place” she added.

The minister also announced £2 million of criminals’ recovered assets will be reinvested in helping communities tackle gun crime.

*The full HMI report- ‘Guns, Community and Police’ – can be found on http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/hmic/new.htm

*A consultation paper on the review of firearms legislation is available on the Home Office website, www.homeoffice.gov.uk.

*The Home Office is also developing a website dedicated to gun crime issues and welcomes views on what should be included. This can be found at http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/crime/guncrime/connected/index.html

The report’s main recommendations:

• Good practice guidelines on Independent Advisory Groups to

• be circulated by ACPO (race and community relations) by

• December 2004.

• Revised guidelines on cross border operations to be circulated by ACPO (police use of firearms) within four months of receiving legal advice by December 2004

• A performance assessment framework to measure force and BCU achievements in reducing gun crime to be developed by ACPO (strategic tasking and co-ordinating group) by December 2004

• ACPO and HMIC to review risk and threat assessments carried out by forces, detailed in the code of practice. Numbers of authorised firearms officers should be reviewed.

• All forces to review their use of NCIS firearms tracing service by September 2004

• ACPO and the Forensic Science Service to review ways of maximising forensic intelligence.

• ACPO PNC policy and prioritisat