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FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REQUEST REFERENCE NO: FOI-24-2024
I write in connection with your request for information which was received on 5th January 2024 as follows:
Please accept my sincere apologies for the delay in providing the response to your request and for any inconvenience that this may have caused you. Please find the Warwickshire Police response set out below.
Response: Please be advised that not all of the requested information is held in a readily retrievable format. With regard to Q3 and Q4 of your request, there is no specific identifier for ‘bicycle’, and no flag or marker to easily identify when this has occurred in relation to an offence of ‘Robbery’. Keyword searches are not carried out routinely as they are not reliable, they will only bring back records where the chosen keyword(s) is present within the MO Description / Incident Summary of an investigation, these are limited free text fields and do not contain all information in relation to an investigation. In order to provide an accurate response to your request it would be necessary to review the wider investigation papers in relation to each and every crime of Robbery that has taken place during the stated period. This would take an inordinate amount of time and would undoubtedly exceed the amount to which we are legally required to respond, i.e., the cost of locating and retrieving the information exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004. For Police forces in the UK, the "appropriate limit" is up to 18 hours of work on one request.
Although the limitations of a keyword search have been explained, in order to offer assistance, the analyst did conduct a search for Robbery offences (Home Office Codes 34A and 34B), recorded between 1st January 2019 and 31st December 2023, where the keywords ‘bike’ or ‘bicycle’ are present within the MO Description. However, this returned 285 results and, in order to determine which of those involved the theft of a bicycle (and subsequently the value of the bike stolen), it would again be necessary to manually review the wider investigation on an individual basis and would still exceed the fees limit.
In accordance with Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000, please treat this letter as the Refusal Notice I am required to provide to you in respect of your request. Please note that if one part of a request exceeds the fees limit, then Section 12 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 which would need to be individually reviewed, I am unable to suggest a way to reduce your request into one which could be managed within the fees limit.
As a gesture of goodwill I have provided information in relation to Q1 and Q2 of your request set out below; however, this should not be taken as precedent that additional information would be supplied outside of the time/fees legislation for any subsequent requests.
Q1 response: Searches were conducted for all offences of ‘Theft or Unauthorised Taking of a Pedal Cycle’ (Home Office Code 44), recorded between 1st January 2019 and 31st December 2023.
Offence |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
Total |
Attempted - Theft or Unauthorised Taking of a Pedal Cycle |
8 |
3 |
3 |
7 |
7 |
28 |
Theft or Unauthorised Taking of a Pedal Cycle |
592 |
404 |
357 |
468 |
469 |
2290 |
Grand Total |
600 |
407 |
360 |
475 |
476 |
2318 |
Q2 response:
Outcomes |
||||||
Outcome Type |
2019 |
2020 |
2021 |
2022 |
2023 |
Total |
Type 1 - Charged/Summonsed/Postal Requisition |
9 |
6 |
7 |
10 |
5 |
37 |
Type 1A - Charged/Summons - alternate offence. Offender has been charged under the alternate offence rule. |
|
1 |
|
|
|
1 |
Type 2 - Caution Youth |
1 |
|
|
|
1 |
2 |
Type 8 - Community resolution (Crime) |
2 |
1 |
|
2 |
|
5 |
Type 14 - Evidential Difficulties Victim Based- Suspect Not Identified: Crime Confirmed But The Victim Either Declines Or Unable To Support Further Police Investigation To Identify The Offender |
17 |
22 |
20 |
36 |
48 |
143 |
Type 15 - Named Suspect Identified: Victim Supports Police Action But Evidential Difficulties Prevent Further Action |
24 |
14 |
14 |
14 |
6 |
72 |
Type 16 - Named Suspect Identified: Evidential Difficulties Prevent Further Action: Victim Does Not Support (Or Has Withdrawn Support From) Police Action |
26 |
15 |
24 |
21 |
15 |
101 |
Type 18 - Investigation Complete; No Suspect Identified. Crime Investigated As Far As Reasonably Possible-Case Closed Pending Further Investigative Opportunities Becoming Available |
1 |
|
1 |
1 |
|
3 |
Type 20 - Further action resulting from the crime report will be undertaken by another body or agency subject to the victim (or person acting on their behalf) being made aware of the act to be taken |
516 |
347 |
293 |
391 |
383 |
1930 |
Type 21 - Further investigation resulting from crime report which could provide evidence sufficient to support formal action against the suspect is not in the public interest - police decision. |
1 |
|
|
|
|
1 |
Type 22 - Diversionary, educational or intervention activity, resulting from the crime report, has been undertaken and it is not in the public interest to take any further action. |
3 |
1 |
1 |
|
|
5 |
Under Investigation |
|
|
|
|
18 |
18 |
Grand Total |
600 |
407 |
360 |
475 |
476 |
2318 |
Please be advised that value of bicycles stolen is not held in a readily retrievable format and in order to determine such information, where held, it would be necessary to review each and every one of the 2318 offences on an individual basis. An estimate of the time involved is set out below:
2318 crimes @ 4 minutes each = 9272 minutes / 60 = 155 hours
Therefore, the work involved in locating, retrieving and recording 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.
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