Various offences data 1036/2024
FOI Reference: 1036/2024
Request:
Please see below a Freedom of Information request in relation to incidents of spiking, harassment and stalking, sex assault and rape reported to your police force.
I look forward to hearing from you within 20 working days.
Q1 SPIKING
- The total number of alleged, or known, incidents of ‘spiking’, recorded by your force during the following years (1 January – 31 December):
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
Q2 HARASSMENT AND STALKING
The total number of alleged, or known, incidents of
- Harassment – classification code 8L
- Stalking – classification code 8Q
reported to your force during the following years (1 January – 31 December):
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
Q3 SEX ASSAULT
The total number of alleged, or known, incidents of sex assault reported to your force during the following years (1 January – 31 December):
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
Q4 RAPE
The total number of alleged, or known, incidents of rape reported to your force during the following years (1 January – 31 December):
2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
2022
2023
Clarification sought
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 received
We are referring to incidents.
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Response
Section 1 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 places two duties on public authorities. Unless exemptions apply, the first duty at Section 1(1) (a) is to confirm or deny whether the information specified in a request is held. The second duty at Section 1(1) (b) is to disclose information that has been confirmed as being held.
Where exemptions are relied upon Section 17 of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires Dyfed Powys Police, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which: (a) states that fact, (b) specifies the exemption in question and (c) states (if that would not otherwise be apparent) why the exemption applies.
I can confirm that Dyfed-Powys Police does hold the information you have requested. However, we are withholding the whole of the requested information since we consider that the Section 12(1) exemption the Cost of Compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit applies to it.
Section 12 (1) – The cost of compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit
Section 12(1) states: “…Section 1 (1) does not oblige a public authority to comply with a request for information if the authority estimates that the cost of complying with the request would exceed the appropriate limit.”
The cost of providing you with the information requested in respect of your request is above 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. It is estimated that it would exceed 18 hours (i.e. minimum of 36,768 hours) to comply with this part of your request. The regulations can be located @ https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2004/3244
The Freedom of Information department has been advised that the information in respect of Questions 1 - 4 of your request is not held in an easily retrievable format. In light of this and in order to accurately obtain the information relative to your request for the time frame stipulated would involve Dyfed Powys Police accessing and manually reviewing a total of 220,616 records.
It has also been established that it would take a minimum of 10 minutes to review and obtain the information for a single record in respect of your request (as outlined above).
The process outlined results in the below time estimate:-
Question 1 - 134,543 records x 10 mins = 22,423
Question 2 - 61,843 records x 10 mins = 10,307
Question 3 - 12,115 records x 10 mins = 2,019
Question 4 – 12,115 records x 10 mins = 2,019
Time estimate to complete task = 36,768 hours
In accordance therefore with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a Refusal Notice for the Whole of this request under Section 17(5) A public authority which, in relation to any request for information, is relying on a claim that section 12 or section 14 applies must, within the time for complying with section 1(1), give the applicant a notice stating that fact.
You may wish to refine and resubmit your request so that it reduces the time shown above to fall within the 18 hours, should you require any further advice in relation to this matter please don’t hesitate to contact the Freedom of Information Unit. Please also be advised that should the request be refined, it does not remove the public authorities right to cite exemptions if relevant.
(This is a response under the Freedom of Information Act 2000 and disclosed on 07/11/2024)