FOI 663-2023 / July 2023 / Theft of watches
FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: 663-2023
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 12th July 2023 as follows:
I am writing to you under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 to request the following information on lost and stolen wrist watches.
Q1. How many watches were recorded as stolen in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022? Please provide figures for each year.
Q2. What was the combined value of these watches? Please provide figures for each year.
Q3. How many watches have been recorded as stolen in the first six months of 2023 – 1st January 2023 to 30th June 2023?
Q4. What was the combined valued of these watches?
Q5. What percentage/number of watches recorded as stolen in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 were recovered?
Q6. What percentage/number of watches reported stolen in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 involved some form of violence against the owner/person wearing the watch?
Q7. What percentage/number of watches reported stolen in the first six months of 2023 involved some form of violence against owner/person wearing the watch?
Q8. What percentage/number of watches reported stolen in 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022 and 2023 have resulted in the fatality of the victim?
Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Response: Please be advised that the requested information is not centrally recorded and is therefore not held in a readily retrievable format. Regarding questions 1 to 5, there is no offence relating specifically to theft of watches, and no flag or marker to identify where this has occurred in relation to a theft offence. The business area has advised that there are approximately 10,000 theft related offences recorded each year, including Robbery and Burglary, where a watch could feasibly be reported stolen. In order to determine a response to the request, it would be necessary to individually review each and every one, to establish whether the offence involved or included the theft of a watch, and, where recorded, the value and outcome. This would take an inordinate amount of time and therefore, the work involved in locating and retrieving the information requested exceeds the cost threshold (£450), which equates to 18 hours work at a standard rate of £25 per hour, as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
Please note that police forces do not use generic systems or identical procedures for capturing data. For these reasons this response should not be used for comparison purposes with responses you may receive from other police forces.
In accordance with section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for this request, and, if one question exceeds the limit, then this applies to the whole request.
In accordance with Section 16 of the Act, I have a duty to provide advice and assistance; however, due to the volume of records that would need to be individually reviewed, I am unable to suggest a way to reduce this part of your request into one which could be managed within the fees limit. In relation to Q6, as this will also require the manual review of all Robbery and Aggravated Burglary offences, recorded in the 4-year period, this would also exceed the fees limit, based on the number of offences recorded. Should you wish to revise and resubmit your request, I can advise that it may be possible to provide some information in relation to Q7, as the scope of this part of the request is significantly reduced to a 6-month period and would require review of Robbery and Aggravated Burglary offences, rather than all thefts. It may also be possible to provide a response to Q8, as an incident resulting in a fatality of this nature would be recorded as murder or manslaughter, which, as they are less common offence types, will significantly reduce the number of results.
Every effort has been made to ensure that the information provided is as accurate as possible.
Your attention is drawn to the below which details your right of complaint.
Should you have any further enquiries concerning this matter, please write or email the Freedom of Information Unit quoting the reference number above.
Yours sincerely
Freedom of Information Officer
Freedom of Information Unit
Warwickshire Police
PO Box 4
Leek Wootton
Warwickshire
CV35 7QB