Child Abuse and Child Neglect

LS Palmer made this Freedom of Information request to Criminal Records Bureau This request has been closed to new correspondence. Contact us if you think it should be reopened.

Response to this request is long overdue. By law, under all circumstances, Criminal Records Bureau should have responded by now (details). You can complain by requesting an internal review.

Dear Criminal Records Bureau,

Since 1 January 2005 please provide a year by year break down of how many convictions have been for the following offences:

1. Battery of a child
2. GBH of a child.
3. Sexual abuse of a child
4. Neglect of a child
5. Emotional abuse of a child
6. Murder of a child

For the same period please could you state whether those convicted of the offences were related to the child victim and if so in what capacity ie:

a. Birth Family
b. Foster family
c. Adoptive Family
d. Legal Guardian (other than a, b, c, e)
e. Step Family
f. Childminder
g. Civil Servant

Yours faithfully,

LS Palmer

CRB Freedom Of Information, Criminal Records Bureau

Dear Mr/s Palmer

Thank you for your request for information made under the Freedom of
Information Act 2000.

The Criminal Records Bureau remit is to assist UK employers in the
recruitment process of individuals who will be working with children and
vulnerable adults by issuing "Certificates".

The CRB does not hold a copy of the Police National Computer (PNC) record
of convictions. The system held by the CRB is known as a PNC Extract. The
extract contains basic identifying details such as name and date of birth
of persons included on the PNC. The extract does not contain any
conviction information. The police force both own and maintain all
information contained on the PNC.

The CRB issues Higher Level Certificates for employment and licensing
purposes, as provided for in part V of the Police Act 1997. Higher Level
CRB checks (Standard and Enhanced) can only be asked for in relation to
positions that are included in the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974
(ROA) (Exceptions) Order 1975. These are positions/licensing requirements
for which an employer/regulatory authority may ask to see spent as well as
unspent conviction information, cautions, reprimands and warnings held on
the Police National Computer (PNC).

The CRB will only hold criminal information if it has been released as
part of a CRB check. Having assessed your request I can confirm we should
be able to provide data for the first part of the request based on the
number of checks which have disclosed information, however before we
proceed I would be grateful if you could clarify the following:

. We may not hold the specific convictions listed at 1-6 as it
depends on what details have been disclosed by the police as part of the
check. To avoid misinterpretation, please select the relevant ACPO codes
that the conviction search should be performed against. Please see link
below to the Retention Guidelines for Nominal Records on the Police
National Computer. The codes can be found in appendix 3.

.
[1]http://www.acpo.police.uk/asp/policies/D...

. Searches using the ACPO codes alone will not provide entirely
accurate results and so to make the search more robust we will also
perform a search based on key words. Can you advise which words should be
used?

. Results will be displayed by conviction volume per ACPO code
(not by application, as some applications may produce more than one
conviction on the certificate)

. The results will be based on CRB Disclosure application data
only

Unfortunately we are unable to provide the information for the second part
of your request as the CRB do not hold this data. The police own and
maintain criminal record information.

I would be grateful if you would confirm if you wish to proceed with this
request. If so I would be grateful if you could confirm the details above.

On receipt of your response I will process your request.

Kind Regards

Elise Snelham

CRB Freedom of Information Team

show quoted sections