Wanted man murdered homeowner after report to police - Derbyshire Constabulary, June 2019
On 19 June 2019, a man reported to Derbyshire Constabulary that a man known to the police kept staying at his house uninvited and had been taking money out of his online bank account. The incident was categorised as anti-social behaviour. A risk assessment called THRIVE was conducted but no risk level was identified as this part was not completed. The male was advised to call police in an emergency and a task was generated to visit his home address the following day. An officer attended the man’s home on 20 June 2019 but there was no reply. He was later de-assigned from the incident. No further actions were carried out during the following week. On 28 June 2019, it was noted that there were no updates and the officer who dealt with the incident initially would be on duty the next day.
An appointment was scheduled the next day and the officer updated the log with a theft occurrence reference number. The officer stated that the incident could be closed, and he would work from the crime report. A supervisor, in the control room, advised that the incident was not suitable to run from the crime report and that the risk had not been mitigated. A check was completed on the police national computer (PNC). The known man staying at the occupier’s house was shown as ‘wanted’ for a robbery offence committed in November 2018. No units were free to attend. On 30 June, the man’s neighbour called the police to report a concern for welfare as they had not seen him for a week. Officers attended the man’s address later that day and the known man was arrested for robbery and taken to custody. The known man was subsequently charged with murder of the man occupying the address.
This came to our attention on 3 July 2019 as a Death or Serious injury (DSI) referral. During our investigation, we obtained CCTV, witness statements, airwave recordings, GPS and incident logs. We also obtained and reviewed relevant policies, procedures, and guidance. A staff member and two police officers submitted statements under the misconduct caution.
Our investigation concluded in January 2020, but we waited until all external proceedings were complete to publish our findings. We concluded that the staff member and one police officer had a case for misconduct with proceedings in the form of a misconduct meeting. No disciplinary proceedings were attended by the staff member because they resigned. We concluded that the other officer did not have a case to answer. However, based on the available evidence, we were of the opinion that this officer’s performance had fallen below the standard that is required in respect of their ongoing management of the incident from 20 June to ensure further action was taken and the Control Room updated. We were satisfied that these issues could be dealt with through immediate management action.
We shared our findings with Derbyshire Constabulary who agreed with our conclusions.
We carefully considered whether there were any learning opportunities arising from the investigation. We make learning recommendations to improve policing and public confidence in the police complaints system and to prevent a recurrence of similar incidents.
We identified eight areas of organisational learning and consulted with Derbyshire Constabulary during the investigation. Derbyshire Constabulary started to address the identified learning prior to the recommendations being issued under Paragraph 28A of the Police Reform Act 2002.