Recommendation - Sussex Police, September 2020
IOPC reference
Recommendations
The IOPC recommends that Sussex Police should change its policy to state that all non-covert arrest enquiries will have at least one officer wearing a body worn camera in attendance.
During the course of this investigation it transpired that plain clothes officers from Sussex Police are not currently able to equip body worn cameras. This means that police work such as arrest enquiries are not filmed when conducted by plain clothes officers potentially resulting in loss of evidence and offering less protection to both plain clothes officers and the public compared to when uniformed officers carry out the same enquiries.
Accepted
The Force has been undergoing a refresh of BWV equipment and has been seeking to explore available technologies and respond to enhanced operational requirements. We currently have a mixed estate of Edesix and Reveal supplied cameras as part of the transition to better technology.
The Force has invested in new cameras which are available for use when officers are working in plain clothes with an overt mounting option. We are also continuing some trials of BWV (smaller versions) which may also be suitable for plain clothes police work. Our current policing relates to the overt use of BWV and by this we mean general policing duties, whether in plain clothes or not. The policy is not intended to cover the use of covert cameras for more sensitive operations where the use of BWV is deliberately not used in an obvious way.
The cameras available for plain clothes deployments are in addition to overt deployment options which already exist in the Force on a personal issue basis and are supplied form a pool of cameras as the general expectation is one of overt carriage/visibility.
The force recognises the importance of BWV in evidence capture and the benefit they bring to investigations of all types.
I believe that the current position enables flexibility to avoid situations like this occurring in future. I will submit this leanring to the Organisational learning Board where is can be monitored and communicated across the force.