Recommendation - Cambridgeshire Constabulary, January 2023
We identified organisational learning from a review in January 2023.
A child, who was in the care of social services, was arrested and taken to custody. The child was detained in custody and subject to a strip search with a representative from a local appropriate adult (AA) service present.
The Police and Criminal Evidence Act requires a parent, guardian, social worker or, if the child is in the care of a local authority or voluntary organisation a person representing that authority or organisation, should be contacted in the first instance to act as the AA.
It is only after reasonable attempts are made to contact a relevant AA, that a local AA service should be used. Officers were aware that the child was in the care of social services, yet there was minimal evidence to indicate what attempts had been made, if any.
The custody record did not consistently document all relevant information regarding the AA’s, including the times they were requested and arrived in custody.
IOPC reference
Recommendations
The IOPC recommends that Cambridgeshire Constabulary should review its guidance, training and procedures concerning the provision of Appropriate Adults to ensure custody staff:
a) Understand relevant legislation and national guidance regarding the provision of Appropriate Adults. In particular, that a social worker or representative of a local authority should be contacted in the first instance to act an Appropriate Adult for a child who is in the care of that authority.
b) Document on the custody record when an Appropriate Adult has been requested, any contact with them and the time they arrived in custody.
c) Consider, if possible, whether the attendance of an Appropriate Adult at specific points during a child’s detention could be pro-actively managed or planned to support the Appropriate Adults attendance and prevent delays.
This follows an appeal where a child was arrested and taken to custody. A local authority were the legal parents. PACE requires that a parent, guardian, social worker or local authority representative should be contacted in the first instance to act as an Appropriate Adult (AA). Only after reasonable attempts have been made to do so should the local AA service be used. Custody staff knew the child was in the care of social services. It appears unlikely that attempts were made to contact social services. In any event no record was made to indicate what attempts had been tried, or not. It appears the local AA service was utilised to speed up the booking in process which included a strip search.
Similarly, several times, the social worker was not contacted to be the AA until the last minute when that could have been planned in advance. This resulted in delays to the social worker attending the custody suite or them having to be present over the phone. Custody staff did not seem to be aware that the local authority social worker should have been contacted as the first port of call to be the AA.
During the child's detention the custody record did not consistently document all relevant information regarding the AA’s, in particular the times that the AA’s were requested or arrived in custody.
Recommendation accepted:
Office of PCC and Corporate Comms will receive the necessary information from Cambridgeshire Organisational Learning Board, to publish on Cambs Transparency Page.