A.C. 1.2 – Assess the usefulness of investigative techniques in criminal investigations (20)
Intelligence Databases:
‘Intelligence’ is often referred to as the information obtained from many sources in some cases, or information that
is collected from confidential sources, such as hospital medical records of a criminal. Intelligence data/information is
often stored in a variety of different ways, such as USB, most common in a database to which the police have access,
but local authorities may also get access by law. In relation to where databases may be used are in Police station,
the advantage of this is that police have quick access to details for a suspect or a already have a profile for other
criminal that might give then advantage and clues in who the criminal might be. The main disadvantage of using a
database within a police setting is that, some police officers might misuse the database for their own personal or
financial gain, as seen in the case of ‘Pc Amardeep Singh Johal’ – where he was a former metropolitan police officer,
sentenced for 6 year imprisonment for blackmailing 11 sex offenders and suspected criminals to give him money. In
2016 a report by the ‘Associated Press (AP)’ determined that police officers across the United States misused
confidential law enforcement database information illegitimately, often looking into the personal information of
people that they were close to. In many cases, the data misuse resulted in cases involving personal stalking,
harassment, and even identity theft. Databases might also be used in scientific laboratory, the main advantage of
using a database with this setting is that the forensics can easily and quickly access data and input data, the main
disadvantage is that if the forensic scientist is closely related to the suspects of the criminal cases, they might either
mis use the data analysed and put other information in order not to incriminate the suspect.
Gang Matrix
It is a database that holds information on suspected gang members. It is mainly located in London, due to more
gangs being located in the capital. The Matrix was created in an attempt to tackle the gang violence and crimes in
local communities and to then protect communities. The main weakness of this type of database is that the Gangs
Matrix is a racially biased database criminalising a generation of young black men. Some have never even committed
a serious offence before, but still find themselves stigmatised and targeted by the police. A report by Stafford Scott,
The Monitoring Group (Tottenham) suggests that ‘If you’re black and born on an estate, nowadays the system
automatically sees you as being in a gang.' However, statistics from ‘Amnesty International’ and ‘The Monitoring
Group’ in reality found out that the Matrix overwhelmingly targets young black men. The next weakness is that due
to targeting young black people they are often labelled as suspected gang members based on weak indicators,
sometimes simply because they have been victims of gang violence themselves. Or for reasons as trivial as the music
(Drill music) they listen to and the videos they watch online. But even worse Metropolitan Police are interfering with
young people’s privacy rights by sharing this data with other authorities. Which infringes Article 8 of Human Rights
and the ECHR. for quite a long time, the Metropolitan Police have gathered people in light of the 2011 London riots,
giving them a 'violence ranking' from green, to amber and red. As of October 2017, almost 4,000 individuals were on
the Matrix. The socioeconomics of those on the information base raises profound concerns. 78% are black
Interpol
The ‘International Criminal Police Organization’ (Interpol are an inter-governmental organization. They currently
have 194 member countries, and they help police in all of the countries to work together to make the world a safer
place. In order to do this, Interpol allows sharing and accessing of data on crimes and criminals, this means that the
UK Police have access to databases with millions of criminals, main criticism of this is that it violates European
Convention on Human Rights as well as civil liberties in every country. Main advantage of Interpol is that of their
‘Red Notice’ - The state notifies all members of Interpol that it has an arrest warrant, sanctioned by a court, for an
individual, and, should the location of said individual be determined, a request for his or her extradition will be
issued. An example of this is in the case of ‘Harry Dun’. Motorcyclist Mr Dunn died in a crash with a car near US
military base RAF Croughton on 27 August. Mrs Sacoolas, the wife of a US intelligence official, claimed diplomatic
immunity and returned home. Anne Sacoolas, pictured on her wedding day in 2003, cited diplomatic immunity after
the crash outside RAF Croughton. The 42-year-old was charged with causing death by dangerous driving in
December, but an extradition request was rejected. This leads to another weakness of Interpol’s ‘Red Notice’. The
notice is not a ‘request for arrest’. The state on whose territory the person has been located, makes a decision
independently as to whether the person will be arrested or not. In this case in January US denied extradition and
