FOI 11639 and 11640 Section 16

FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NOs:  West Mercia Police 11639 and Warwickshire Police 11640

I write in connection with your requests for information which were received on 10 April 2019.  Please find below the responses to your requests for West Mercia Police and Warwickshire Police information:

Please disclose:

The number of people reported to your force for an offence under Section 16 [of the Offences Against the Person Act 1861].

The number of people charged as a result. 

The number of people reported to your force for an offence under Section 16 which involved the use of social media. 

The number of people charged as a result.

For each question, please provide data for each calendar of these calendar years: 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016 2017 and 2018.

REPLY: Please see attached tables

West Mercia Police 11639

Warwickshire Police 11640

Please note that in order to determine whether a s.16 offence has involved the use of social media, crime reports have been searched for the following key words:  "Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, TikTok, Tumblr, Reddit, Social Media, Snapchat, Tinder, Okcupid, Plenty of Fish, Bumble, Myspace, Bebo, Vine, Discord, Grindr, Happn, 4Chan, Pinterest, Fortnite, Linkedin, WhatsApp, Skype and Mumsnet."  The method of communication is also not always recorded in the crime report.