ACCESS TO CRIME REPORTS
Near Instant Access to Crime Reports in Your NeighbourhoodMr and Mrs Porter were enjoying a night out at a local restaurant when they received a mobile phone call from the police. A burglary had recently taken place on their street and they were advised to secure their property. Not wishing to interrupt their meal, they called upon neighbours to keep watch until they returned home. They need not have worried. Their neighbours had also registered with the police to receive crime information either by phone or e-mail. The Porters` experience of receiving almost instantaneous reports on local crimes is shared by millions of residents, but not by you and me. Why? Because the Porters live in the USA and unlike, major cities in the States, most police forces in the United Kingdom are reluctant to engage so closely with the public.Privacy, especially that of victims of crime, is often cited by the police as a reason for not releasing location-specific crime data, but the Data Protection Act does not prohibit publication of anonymised crime data. Of course, such data would be used by incoming residents to Nottingham and those planning a move to other parts of the City. Claims that this would stigmatise the higher crime areas of Nottingham should be brushed aside. We have a right to know and a right rationally to choose where we live. Yes, there are many citizens in Nottingham who are not in a position to make such a choice, but greater public awareness of higher criminal activity in less desirable areas will concentrate minds and generate a greater understanding of the reasons underlying the uneven distribution of police resources in our City. Official statistics show that all types of crime are declining in Nottingham, yet the fear of crime remains endemic. As long as the Police keep the public in a state of ignorance about crimes in their neighbourhoods, the fear of crime will persist. There is some hope, however. The Home Office has requested police forces to publish location-specific crime figures on a fortnightly or monthly basis, and Nottinghamshire Police has responded positively to this request. However, their crime maps contain little information of value to Neighbourhood Watch members. Bad news may travel fast, but four week-old statistics do not travel fast enough to keep one from being the next victim of a burglary or car theft. For effective community involvement in crime prevention, residents need to have knowledge of, and respond, to very recent criminal events. They need daily crime reports. At the very least, perhaps the pledge by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, that the Metropolitan Police will eventually publish crime data by street level will encourage Nottinghamshire Police to follow suit. How much would it cost Nottinghamshire Police to provide us with up-to-date crime reports? In fact very little, and the cost could be vastly outweighed by the benefits. According to the USA experience it takes less than one hour each day to upload the crime data. The information is then geocoded with e-mail or telephone alerts being sent to relevant, registered residents. At the same time the information is made available to the general public on a website (www.CrimeOrg.com or www.SpotCrime.com) using Google mapping. The technology to do this has been available to Nottinghamshire Police for about 12 months, but without crime data it has sat idle. It seems ludicrous to me that I can go online to a street in Chicago, for example, to obtain an almost instantaneous account of crimes committed, but find nothing about crimes on my own road. The Nottinghamshire Police Force is uniquely placed to provide a service similar to that experienced by the Porters. It should be brave and put it into practice forthwith. What a coup that would be for Nottinghamshire and what a boost it would give to the relationship between the police and the community it serves. Peter Usherwood 5 January 2009 |