Response to missing person's report - North Yorkshire Police, December 2017
At 8.59pm on 4 December 2017, a man telephoned North Yorkshire Police (NYP) and reported his wife missing from home. He explained he last saw her at 7pm that evening; she had mental health issues and had previously attempted to take her own life when she had gone missing in the past. NYP initially graded the incident as ‘medium’ risk and conducted initial enquiries. At 11.16pm, a supervisor re-graded the incident to ‘high’ risk due to the length of time she had been missing and requested authorisation for telephone intelligence work to assist in locating her. The duty superintendent refused this authorisation based on the information presented to him by the on-call data communications single point of contact (SPOC).
At 1.01am on 5 December, the supervisor reiterated the request for telephone intelligence work and at 1.41am, recorded that the NYP SPOC did not think the criteria had been met and was unwilling to contact the duty superintendent to discuss the request again. NYP continued to search for the woman throughout the night but did not locate her. At 7.34am, a member of the public found her body on a beach. At the conclusion of the inquest regarding her death, the coroner recorded an open verdict.
During the investigation, investigators reviewed the evidence and obtained statements from the on-duty inspectors and the superintendent.
The Investigator determined there was an indication that the on-call SPOC may have acted in a manner that would justify the bringing of disciplinary proceedings and served them with a notice of investigation. The SPOC provided us with a detailed written response to their notice explaining the rationale for their actions. They subsequently resigned from their role with NYP, refused to provide any contact details and would not attend an interview.
As a result of the SPOC resigning, at the conclusion of the investigation neither we nor NYP were legally able to make any determinations as to their conduct.