Convictions of serving police officers

October 22, 2008

Dear Mr. Mulholland,

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated October 21, 2008 which was received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) on October 21, 2008. I note you seek access to the following information:

Number of serving officers with criminal convictions

This request will be dealt with under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. A response should be sent to you within 20 working days. The Freedom of Information team will advise you in writing if there are any delays in responding to your request and will keep you advised of progress.

In the event where the cost of complying with the request would exceed the "appropriate level", which is fixed at £450, as stated in the Freedom of Information Regulations 2004, it is the policy of the PSNI to close the request. You will however be notified of this decision and given an opportunity to refine and resubmit the request.

If your request requires either full or partial transference to another public authority in order to answer your query, again, you will be notified.
If you have any queries regarding your request please write or contact the Freedom of Information Team on 028 9070 0164. Please remember to quote the reference number listed above in any future communications with the Freedom of Information Team.

If you are dissatisfied in any way with the handling of your request, you have the right to request a review.You should do this as soon as possible, or in any case within two months of the date of issue of this letter.In the event that you require a review to be undertaken, you can do so by writing to the Head of Freedom of Information, PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road, Belfast, BT5 6LE or by emailing [email address].

If following an internal review, carried out by an independent decision maker, you were to remain dissatisfied in any way with the handling of the request you may make a complaint,under Section 50 of the Freedom of Information Act, to the Information Commissioner's Office and ask that they investigate whether the PSNI has complied with the terms of the Freedom of Information Act. You can write to the Information Commissioner at Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane, Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. In most circumstances the Information Commissioner will not investigate a complaint unless an internal review procedure has been carried out, however the Commissioner has the option to investigate the matter at his discretion.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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October 29, 2008

Dear Mr. Mulholland,

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated October 21, 2008 which was received by the The Police Service of Northern Ireland on October 21, 2008. I note you seek access to the following information:

Number of serving officers with criminal convictions

To enable the Police Service of Northern Ireland to meet your request could you please provide further clarification on the following;

This information is not held centrally, the only way to obtain it would be to provide the Criminal Records Bureau with a list of all serving officers so that they could check each individual one against their records. This would be very time consuming and in all probability exceed the cost ceiling of £450.

The Professional Standards Department (PSD) of the PSNI has responsibility for internal discipline relating to police officers. What PSD can do to retrieve information within cost would be to supply the numbers of officers convicted of criminal offences while still serving and reported to the Department since the inception of the PSNI in 2001(this would not include Trainee Officers who have been dealt with by the Police College).

It should be noted however, that not all convictions are recorded by this Department e.g. officers who are to be reported for a minor traffic offence such as careless driving not associated with any other factors - these may be dealt with by local management without recourse to PSD. The figure would not include the issue of fixed penalty tickets to Police Officers - the PSNI does not specifically record the issue of fixed penalty notices to police officers.

DO YOU WISH TO BE SUPPLIED WITH THE INFORMATION WHICH IS AVAILABLE FROM PSD OR HOW DO YOU WISH TO PROCEED WITH YOUR REQUEST?

You should be aware that the 20 day legislative time limit dictated by the Freedom of Information Act 2000 has been stopped until we receive clarification of your request.

Please send clarification of your request by writing to Freedom of Information Team, PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road Belfast BT5 6LE or by email to [email address]. Alternatively, if you wish to discuss your request or have any additional queries you can contact me on 028 9070 0164.

Yours sincerely,

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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Dear M. Mulholland,

Could you please confirm that the request you are referring to

is F-2008-04811? If this is the case you have not yet received

a response to your request, you have only been asked to clarify

whether or not you wished to receive the information held by our

Professional Standards Department or not. You contacted us and

pointed out that you wanted your request to be processed as you

originally asked, this is being done.

You cannot ask for an internal review until you receive a
response

to your request and then if you are not happy with our response

you can ask for a review.

If you have any further concerns please do not hesitate to
contact

us.

In any future correspondence please use the reference number
above.

Thank you
Don Maginnes
PSNI FOI Team
02890 650222 ext 22650

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Subject: F-2008-04811

November 19, 2008

Dear Mr. Mulholland,

FREEDOM of INFORMATION ACT 2000

I write in connection with your request for information dated October 21,
2008 which was received by the Police Service of Northern Ireland on
October 21, 2008 concerning:

Details of numbers of serving officers with criminal convictions

This is to inform you that the Police Service of Northern Ireland has now
completed its search for the information you requested. The decision has
been taken to disclose the located information to you in full.

Question - Please provide details of numbers of serving officers with
criminal convictions (clarified on 12 November 2008 as the number of
police officers who had been convicted while still serving where details
had been reported to the Professional Standards Department of the PSNI
since the inception of the PSNI).

Answer - The PSNI replaced the Royal Ulster Constabulary (GC) on 4.11.01.
From that date until the date of your request a total of 246 officers have
been convicted of a criminal offence while still serving and reported to
Professional Standards Department. The majority of convictions are for
motoring offences.

Further details can be obtained by visiting the our website @
[1]www.psni.police.uk /freedom of information/classes of
information/significant public interest category/PSNI officers convicted
of a criminal offence since the inception of the PSNI on 4.11.01 and
reported to Professional Standards Department.

The figures supplied have been compiled by the PSNI's Professional
Standards Department which has responsibility for internal discipline
relating to police officers.

Officers convicted of criminal offences, in addition to being dealt with
through the normal criminal process, are also subject to internal
misconduct investigations, which may lead to misconduct hearings and
sanctions.

The Police Service expects its staff to behave professionally, ethically
and with the utmost integrity at all times. Whilst the Service takes
extremely seriously any allegation of wrongdoing, the number of cases must
be put into context of the overall size of the police service i.e. from
over 13000 officers in 2001 to just over 8700 officers at the date of your
request.

United Kingdom Police Services do not use generic systems to capture
information. For this reason the PSNI's response to your questions should
not be used for comparison purposes with any other Police Service.

If you have any queries regarding your request or the decision please do
not hesitate to contact the Freedom of Information Team on 028 9070 0164.
When contacting the Freedom of Information Team, please quote the
reference number listed at the beginning of this letter.

If you are dissatisfied in any way with the handling of your request, you
have the right to request a review in accordance with our complaints
procedure. In the event that you require a review to be undertaken, you
can do so by writing to the Head of the Freedom of Information Team,
Freedom of Information, and PSNI Headquarters, 65 Knock Road Belfast BT5
6LE or by emailing [email address].

If following an internal review, carried out by an independent decision
maker, you were to remain dissatisfied in any way with the handling of the
request you may make a complaint,under Section 50 of the Freedom of
Information Act, to the Information Commissioner's Office and ask that
they investigate whether the PSNI has complied with the terms of the
Freedom of Information Act. You can write to the Information Commissioner
at Information Commissioner's Office, Wycliffe House, Water Lane,
Wilmslow, Cheshire, SK9 5AF. In most circumstances the Information
Commissioner will not investigate a complaint unless an internal review
procedure has been carried out, however the Commissioner has the option to
investigate the matter at his discretion.

Please be advised that PSNI replies under Freedom of Information may be
released into the public domain via our website @ [2]www.psni.police.uk

Personal details in respect of your request have, where applicable, been
removed to protect confidentiality.

Yours sincerely

Mr Gordon Reid
A/Head of Freedom of Information

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References

Visible links
1. file://www.psni.police.uk
2. file://www.psni.police.uk