Victim's Right to Review Scheme 2015-2021
Keywords
Operation, Victim, Victim’s, Right to Review, Scheme, VRR, Requests, Data, Outcomes, Investigations, Re-opened, Cases, Referred, CPS, Crown Prosecution Service, Decisions, Chagres, Outcomes, Crime, Types, Rape, Serious, Sexual, Assault, Domestic, Abuse, Violence, Allocated, Officers, Training, Policy, Procedure, Calendar, Years.
Publication Number
PUB 1227
FOI Reference Number
15932
Request Title
Victim's Right to Review Scheme
Date Range
2015-2021
Information Requested
I would like to make a request for the following information about the operation of your Victim's Right to Review Scheme under the Freedom of Information Act 2000:
1. For each year since 2015 please provide the number of VRR requests received by your force.
2. For each year since 2015 please provide your data for outcomes of VRR requests received - this may include investigations re-opened, cases referred to CPS, or decisions to charge - or any other data you collect on outcomes.
3. For each of the requests above in questions 1 and 2 please provide the details for:
a. Total VRR requests for all crime types.
b. VRR requests in cases of rape and serious sexual assault.
c. VRR requests in cases of domestic abuse.
4. Please confirm how officers are allocated to review VRRs.
5. Please confirm whether any specific training is given to officers carrying out VRRs.
6. Please confirm whether, for VRRs involving rape and serious sexual offences, or domestic abuse, there is any requirement for officers carrying out the reviews to have specialist knowledge of those types of offences.
7. Please provide up to date guidance on your VRR procedure.
Disclosure with Exemptions
Partial Disclosure with Section 12(1) Exemption
Information Correct as at
27 July 2021
Date of Disclosure
06 August 2021
Related Documents/Links
N/A
FOI 15932 Response
Having completed enquiries within Essex Police in respect of Section 1(1)(a), Essex Police does hold information relating to your request, however, the obligation of Section 1(1)(b) cannot be met as Essex Police does not hold all the information requested in a format that allows it to be retrieved within the time and cost limits of FOI.
When responding to a request for information under the terms of the FOIA, a public authority is not obliged to provide information if the authority estimates that the cost of the retrieval of the information requested would be in excess of £450 (equivalent to 18 hours work). The costs criteria relates to a request in its entirety, which means that if we cannot retrieve all of the information requested within the costs limit, we are not obliged to retrieve any of the information requested.
Section 12(1) of the FOIA states that a public authority is not obliged to:
“…comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit.”
The following explanation outlines the difficulty Essex Police has in answering your request:
In relation to Question 3c, Essex Police are unable to accurately extract the level of detail in relation to your request from our current systems. Essex Police systems are designed primarily for the management of individual cases and not primarily for the production of statistical information for FOI responses. This request would entail manually extracting the requested data and reviewing each crime record one by one to establish if it was a Domestic Abuse Crime. To establish if information is held would, therefore, exceed the time and cost limits under the FOIA and would qualify as the creation of data as the results cannot be processed by means of purely sorting or filtering data sources or running a database query tool. There is no requirement under the act to create data purely to answer FOI requests.
Consequently, and to this extent, Essex Police are exempt from the duty to provide information you have requested under the provisions of Section 12(1) of the FOIA. Therefore, and in accordance with Section 17(1) of the FOIA, this communication must act as a refusal notice to provide all of the information that could be interpreted as being captured by this part of your request.
Having said that and in an effort to assist, although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the FOIA, Essex Police can confirm the following:
Caveat: The data is correct as at 27 July 2021.
1. For each year since 2015 please provide the number of VRR requests received by your force.
Data is only available from 2018 onwards.
VRR REQUEST 2018 - 2021
|
Year |
Total VRR Requests for All Crime Types |
|---|---|
|
2018 |
86 |
|
2019 |
116 |
|
2020 |
134 |
|
2021 |
77 |
2. For each year since 2015 please provide your data for outcomes of VRR requests received - this may include investigations re-opened, cases referred to CPS, or decisions to charge - or any other data you collect on outcomes.
Data is only available from 2018 onwards
|
Outcome 1 – 6 (VRR Requests for All Crime Types) |
2018 |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
1 - No further action upholds original decision |
70 |
85 |
101 |
37 |
|
2 - Suspect Charged/Summonsed |
1 |
1 |
1 |
0 |
|
3 - Out of court disposal |
0 |
0 |
1 |
3 |
|
4 - Referred to the CPS |
0 |
8 |
2 |
1 |
|
5 - Case has been re-opened |
15 |
22 |
26 |
19 |
|
6 - The original decision is overturned but the case is statute - barred |
0 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
|
0 - Victim has withdrawn support |
0 |
0 |
3 |
1 |
|
On-going |
0 |
0 |
0 |
16 |
3. For each of the requests above in questions 1 and 2 please provide the details for:
a. Total VRR requests for all Crime Types.
VRR REQUEST 2018 - 2021
|
Year |
Total VRR Requests for All Crime Types |
|---|---|
|
2018 |
86 |
|
2019 |
116 |
|
2020 |
134 |
|
2021 |
77 |
b. VRR requests in cases of Rape and Serious Sexual Assault.
VRR REQUEST 2018 - 2021
|
Year |
Total VRR Requests Rape/Serious Sexual Assault |
|---|---|
|
2018 |
24 |
|
2019 |
33 |
|
2020 |
47 |
|
2021 |
21 |
4. Please confirm how Officers are allocated to review VRRs.
The Quality of Service Team are the Central Administrators of the VRR Scheme in force. The request for a VRR is sent to the relevant DCI/Chief Inspector where the crime was investigated who will be responsible for allocation. Guidance to them advises that the review must be conducted by an Officer of the rank of Inspector or higher and must be independent of the original decision-making process.
5. Please confirm whether any specific training is given to Officers carrying out VRRs.
VRR guidance has been available in force since implementation in 2015. We are not aware of any bespoke training course, However, specific guidance/support can be sort on a case by case basis to support review/further investigation requirements.
6. Please confirm whether, for VRRs involving Rape and Serious Sexual Offences, or Domestic Abuse, there is any requirement for Officers carrying out the reviews to have specialist knowledge of those types of offences.
Investigations above would be conducted by Specialist Teams and any request for a VRR would be allocated back to the DCI/Chief Inspector of that Team who would be responsible for review/oversight and allocation to a suitable Officer.
Independent Specialist Violence Advisors (ISVAS) are available to support meetings with the Police and victim (on a case by case basis) where a decision to take no further action is reached in a Rape and Serious Sexual Offence case.
NB. The risk level of the Domestic Abuse Crime may determine that the investigation is allocated to a Local Policing Team. As above, the Chief Inspector would be responsible for oversight.
7. Please provide up to date guidance on your VRR procedure.
Please see B2502 PROCEDURE – Victim Right to Review (VRR).
This procedure will be updated at the next review, which is due November 2021.
The Quality of Service Team administer each request into force for a VRR. An acknowledgement is sent to the victim which includes a brief explanation that they will receive a response within 30 days. If this is not possible the reviewing Officer will keep them updated. The reviewing Officer is responsible for communicating the outcome of the review to the victim in each case.
Every effort is made to ensure that the data provided by Essex Police is accurate and complete. However, Essex Police systems are designed primarily for the management of individual cases and not for the purposes of providing data to answer specific FOI enquiries. Please note although data can be extracted from a number of sources via database queries, the results may be subject to inaccuracies. Care should be taken to understand our return when considering the interpretation or further use of the data.