CCTV reports 688/2024

FOI Reference: 688/2024

Request:

1. In 2023, how many police hours were spent reviewing Police, Private, or Local Authority CCTV footage in relation to all criminal investigations?
2. In 2023, how many police hours were spent reviewing Police, Private, or Local Authority CCTV footage in relation to physical/violent crime or sexual offence reports?
3. In 2023, what proportion of Police CCTV cameras were monitored in real time by a human?
4. In 2023, what proportion of Police CCTV cameras were monitored in real time by technology?
5. Referring to all incidents that took place in institutions (schools, nurseries/kindergartens, hospitals/hospices, care homes etc.) - in 2023, how many police hours were spent reviewing available CCTV footage (Force, Local Authority, or Private) to aid the investigation?
6. Referring to all incidents that took place in institutions (schools, nurseries/kindergartens, hospitals/hospices, care homes etc.) - in 2023, in what proportion of cases did your teams find that the CCTV in question was not available or existent to corroborate the reported incident?

Clarification Q:

1. When you refer to “reports” are you referring to 999/101 calls received?
2. Are you referring to incidents or crimes? Please note an incident is different from a crime.  An incident is a record of contact made to a police force by an individual/member of public (usually via a 999 or 101 call) and a crime is where the threshold has been met for the police force to deem that a criminal offence has occurred as defined by law.

Clarification A:

Thank you for your response. To clarify, 'reports' or 'incidents' should be changed to read 'crimes', so these questions focus on CCTV's use in criminal investigations that the force has conducted. 

I also wanted to mention that I've received responses from other forces, and it seems that most of the requests pertaining to CCTV fall under Section 12 of the FOI Act, with cost of the task exceeding appropriate limit and fees. 

If this is also the case for Dyfed-Powys Police, I'd ask that all previous questions related to CCTV are disregarded, and these requests are considered instead:      

• Could you provide an estimate for the average number of hours spent reviewing CCTV footage in Violence Against the person (inclusive of all sub-categories) criminal investigations in the first half of 2024? This only applies to cases where CCTV footage is available. I understand that this may mean manually examining crime records to see if time spent reviewing CCTV was recorded. If this is the case, please review the maximum amount you can while still falling under the “Appropriate Limits and Fees” Regulation threshold.
• Could you provide the percentage of Violence Against the Person criminal investigations, in the first half of 2024, in which CCTV footage was reviewed? Again, if this requires manual examination of crime records, please only examine the maximum amount permitted under "Appropriate Limits and Fees".

 

Response:

I can confirm that Dyfed-Powys Police does not hold the information requested, this is due to the fact that it is not possible for us to identify how much time officers have spent reviewing CCTV. The audit functionality of the system used can tell us who has reviewed the footage but not for how long.                                         

                                                           

(This is a response under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and disclosed on 08/08/2024)