Recommendation 1
The IOPC recommends that Staffordshire Police amend their Missing Persons Procedure to ensure that the Force Control Centre (FCC) pro-actively notifies the Local Operations Inspector (LOI) whenever a new missing person is recorded on the COMPACT system (a missing persons’ case management system used by Staffordshire Police and some other forces). The procedure should outline what constitutes an effective and proactive notification and how any communication should be recorded on the relevant logs or systems.
This follows an independent IOPC investigation in which a child was reported missing. The investigation found that the LOI on duty was not actively informed by the FCC that the child had been recorded as a missing person. As a result, the LOI took no action throughout their shift, as they were not aware of the case. While the FCC Sergeant ‘tagged’ and passed on ownership of the case, they took no further action to actively notify the relevant LOI.
Staffordshire Police’s Missing Persons Procedure states that on medium and high-risk cases, the FCC Sergeant is responsible for ensuring that the investigation is ‘handed over to the LOI’ and that this is ‘documented.’ It does not state how this handover is to occur nor a timescale for completing it.
The COMPACT system used to record the case currently requires a manual refresh for new missing persons cases to appear, hence why it is important that when a case is ‘tagged’ or assigned to a new officer, they are proactively made aware.
Addressed to: Staffordshire Police
Linked bodies:
Staffordshire Police