Greater Manchester Police complaints
Article published: Sunday, September 19th 2010
Less than one in eighteen Greater Manchester Police officers are disciplined for proven acts of misconduct, figures obtained by MULE suggest.
During 2008 and 2009, Greater Manchester Police (GMP) disciplined eight officers following official complaints made by members of the public, despite 146 proven allegations of police misconduct, ranging from serious non-sexual assault to corruption.
GMP’s statistics detail 3,153 allegations of misconduct made via official complaints to the force in 2008. Of these allegations 77 were proven, yet only four officers were disciplined in this time. The story is similar for 2009, when 69 of 2,892 allegations were proven but again just four officers faced disciplinary action.
Proven allegations included cases of “serious non-sexual assault”, “other sexual contact”, “other assault”, “unlawful arrest”, “oppressive conduct/harassment”, “breach Code C in detention/questioning”, “corrupt practice”, and “other (criminal conduct)”, although in both years approximately two-thirds were cases of “other neglect/failure in duty” and “incivility”.
In a statement, Superintendent Mike Freeman said: “[W]e take all reports of misconduct and poor performance from our officers very seriously and if evidence of misconduct is found, officers will face investigation.
“However, it is important to stress that while an allegation might be upheld, this does not necessarily mean the particular officer involved has done anything wrong. For example, if an individual has their vehicle seized based on the best information available to the officer at the time, but subsequently that information turns out to be incorrect, then an allegation will be upheld but the actions of the officer do not amount to misconduct and therefore do not merit investigation.”
Several recent cases have attracted severe public criticism, however. In June, GMP were forced to pay out £185,000 to 80 Stoke City fans after unlawfully locking them in an Irlam pub for hours last year, under Section 27 of the Violent Crime Reduction Act. They instructed those held to “urinate in cups.” The landlord utterly dismissed GMP’s claims, saying the supporters had in fact been so well behaved he would “make them all sandwiches” if they returned.
In April, two officers were jailed for 18 months for assaulting a 19-year-old woman in custody. The judge told the court that Amy Keigher’s treatment was “little short of torture” after PC Jason Hanvey – who had a similar conviction from 1999 – had held her face against a table and threatened to “rip her skull off”. He refused to allow her to leave the station until she had said “pretty please.”
Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) figures also showed a disproportionate number of complaints coming from minority ethnic groups. During 2007-08, complaints made by non-white people were at 20 per cent, with a further 10 per cent unknown and 2008-09 saw 18 per cent of complainants being non-white and 15 per cent not known.
According to the IPCC, GMP received 387 complaints per 1,000 officers in 2008-09. While by no means the worst performing force in England and Wales, this registered as a massive 92 per cent increase from 2003-04. Moreover, research carried out by Dr Graham Smith of the University of Manchester suggests that many people do not make complaints due to lack of self-confidence but of confidence in the system and of the availability of support and assistance in the process, as well as feelings their grievance may not be serious enough.
There remains little confidence in the neutrality of the complaints system. Like other forces, the overwhelming majority of complaints are handled through ‘informal resolution’ by GMP. A small minority, including cases of deaths in police custody, are investigated by the IPCC – which in turn has been accused, by the families of those who have died in custody, of being far too willing to give police the benefit of the doubt. In the past 11 years over 400 people have died following police contact in England and Wales, yet no officers have been convicted of manslaughter or murder.
Andy Lockhart
This article features in the print edition of The Mule – Issue 10, out now for FREE around Greater Manchester
More: Features, Manchester, Policing
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