Legalised Crime
A couple of different stories from the past few days have cast a bad light on the way that police in England and Wales handle crime.
A report in The Times suggested that forces have all but given up on tacking low-level crimes like theft, assault and harassment. The newspaper obtained figures showing stark examples:
In Hampshire there were 751 bicycle thefts reported and yet no one was charged.
Thames Valley police recorded 340 reports of blackmail with no one charged.
66 attempted burglaries were reported in Warwickshire and, again, no one was charged.
The list goes on and reflects a national trend whereby prosecution rates have plummeted for these smaller offences. Charge rates derived from public reports of distress have collapsed from 25% to 3% since 2015 while charge rates from reports of assault without injury have fallen from 16% to 3% over the same period.
The overall effect is a drop in confidence in the ability of the police to actually do their job.
After all, these are the sort of crimes that the public is most likely to witness or be a victim to. If petty criminals are consistently able to evade justice then what hope is there that officers will be able to solve more serious crimes?
The other story involved former Met Police Officer, Wayne Couzens.