Missing persons

Report: 11
Date: 17 May 2007
By: AC Territorial Policing on behalf of the Commissioner

Summary

This report provides members with an overview of missing persons reported to the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) and the procedures the MPS has in place to investigate them. It provides a summary of the issues specifically relating to young missing persons.

A. Recommendation

That Members note this report

B. Supporting information

Strategic oversight

1. In 2004, the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) commissioned an internal missing persons inspection, which found that there were a number of improvements that could be made in this area. As a result, Operation Compass was set up as a central strategic unit to produce a comprehensive policy for missing persons and provide assistance and support for Boroughs. All the recommendations from the inspection have been completed.

2. A Missing Person Strategic Board was established in 2004, chaired by an MPS Commander with responsibility for crime within Territorial Policing. In 2006, this was transferred to the Violent Crime Directorate. The Metropolitan Police Authority attends this bi-monthly meeting along with relevant internal MPS units and the Police National Missing Persons Bureau (PNMPB).

3. The Metropolitan Police Service Standard Operating Procedures (SOP) for ‘The Investigation of Missing Persons and Unidentified Persons’ was published in March 2005. This incorporated the national recommendations made in the Association of Chief Police Officers ‘Guidance on the management, recording and investigation of missing persons’. The SOP details the minimum standards of investigation, the risk assessment process, supervision and continual review system. Good practice guides are also produced to assist officers with all aspects of the investigation.

4. The MPS records all reports of missing persons on a dedicated IT system, called ‘Merlin’. Considerable funding has been provided to improve the functionality and scope of this system and there is now a tool to carry out management information searches. Unlike other MPS IT applications, Merlin is able to store images and carry out cross match searches against bodies or persons found. However, Merlin is not considered to be a user-friendly application by those who use it infrequently. It is very different to other MPS databases and has no similarities to a windows based product.

5. The NPIA (National Police Improvement Agency) have become involved in the national management of missing persons due to the proposed transfer of the Police National Missing Persons Bureau (PNMPB) out of the MPS in April 2008. This has been agreed by the ACPO national missing person lead who is DAC Richard Bryan and endorsed by the Home Office.

6. The background to this is that the PNMPB is attached to the PNC Bureau but carries out a national function. Being an MPS unit, it currently has access to Merlin and receives faxes and data transfers from other police forces to carry out its principal role of conducting cross match searches on unidentified bodies. Within the current protocol of informing PNMPB of missing persons, the MPS achieves this by default as the unit has Merlin.

7. Post transfer to NPIA, the PNMPB intends to relocate away from New Scotland Yard to NPIA accommodation and work off the Hermes IT system. The reason for this is that the charity Missing People (formally known as the National Missing Person Helpline) use this system and the new protocol requires Missing People to be informed of all unsolved investigations within fourteen days. Now the MPS has not signed the new protocol and only informs Missing People of enquiries on an ad hoc basis. As far as I am aware, there has been no consultation with the MPS about the anticipated loss of Merlin capability in the PNMPB.

8. In the absence of an IT solution, the impact of these changes will be:

• The PNMPB will no longer have access to Merlin so will have to be informed by fax of all twenty-eight thousand people who are reported missing in London every year.
• Although the number will be considerably less as many missing people return within the relevant time scale. The intended new protocol will also require a significant number of faxes between the MPS and the Missing People charity.
• These numbers will probably have to be doubled as in most cases cancellation messages will have to be sent as most missing people return home safe and well.

9. There were 28,899 missing person reports received by the MPS from 1 April 2006 to 31 March 2007, 18,309 cases were young people under the age of 18 years. These figures correlate to the number of reports, not individuals going missing.

10. Independent research by the Children’s Society and Barnados suggests that 100,000 children run away in the UK each year. It would therefore be expected that children missing in London would be a considerably higher figure than 18,000. If the research is correct there is almost certainly under reporting in this area.

11. The Violent Crime Directorate (VCD) Intelligence Unit, now sited within the Metropolitan Intelligence Bureau (MIB), provides daily briefing material on high risk missing persons. This material and other high-risk matters are considered by the VCD. The VCD holds a daily conference attended by each of the Public Protection Units i.e. Community Safety, Sexual Offences, MAPPA and Missing Persons Delivery Teams. Each incident is considered across all lines of business and co-ordinated support is offered to Boroughs. The MIB does not include the Child Abuse Investigation Command intelligence unit.

Borough perspective

12. Boroughs retain ownership of all missing person cases and have autonomy over the resources they utilise for their investigation.

13. All Boroughs now have a dedicated Missing Person Unit (MPU) or a dedicated single point of contact, depending on volume of work. This has resulted in an improved ownership of those cases remaining unsolved after the first few hours.

14. Under the auspices of the Public Protection Steering Group and following a recent Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabularies (HMIC) inspection, there is an active review, by the Commander Sawyer, of staffing levels within Operation Compass and other Public Protection Units.

15. There are no Government or MPS targets or key performance indicators for missing persons. This is under review by VCD Commander.

Training

16. Operation Compass developed a corporate training strategy relating to the recording and investigation of missing persons. A full performance needs analysis (PNA) and training needs analysis (TNA) was carried out. As a result, current training was updated and new training introduced and rolled out across the MPS. Details of the relevant training courses can be found at Appendix 1.

17. The SOP for ‘The Investigation of Missing Persons and Unidentified Persons’ is due for review by March 2008. Operation Compass has commenced this review and is in the planning phase. The new SOP will take into account any emerging issues since it was first published.

Young people

18. Commander Sawyer has tasked a review of missing young people. Research into reports of missing young people in 2005, discovered that 1921 incidents of missing children reports involved repeat missing episodes (Appendix 2). It was not possible to identify whether these children were missing from care or missing from home. Social Services do not have a central list of all the care homes and foster carers in each Borough to compare with the police database. However, independent research shows that children looked after by the Local Authority are over-represented in the figures of missing children. Some of these repeat missing children demand a disproportionate level of resources thereby diverting the focus on the critical few.

19. In recognition of this problem, Operation Compass has worked closely with the London Child Protection Committee (LCPC) in the preparation of the re-launch of their pan-London child protection procedures. As a result a ‘safeguarding children missing from care and home’ procedure has been developed. This requires partnership working between the police, Local Safeguarding Children Boards (LSCBs), Children’s Social Services and care facility managers to address preventative measures.

20. The procedure discourages the reporting of unauthorised absences if the whereabouts of the child is known and it puts more responsibility on the care managers by requiring them to assess both the risk of the child going missing and the risk to the child if they go missing; to prepare an information exchange form; to carry out initial enquiries as expected of a reasonable parent and to identify the issues which caused, and may continue to cause the child to go missing. The procedure states that the child will be offered an opportunity to talk to an independent person about their absence, this is key to safeguarding them as it aims to identify and deal with any harm the child has incurred and address the reasons the child ran away.

21. The MPS is concerned that the LSCBs will not be able to adequately resource this important area. Some Boroughs have already started this piece of work with their partners, however the LCPC Procedures launch was postponed from 2006 to September 2007, which has delayed their full implementation.

22. MPS annual statistics were produced for 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006 and broken down into children and adults; males and females and unsolved cases. Commander Sawyer has requested further research to ascertain why a number of child cases remained unsolved by May 2006. It has established that these fell into three distinct groups i.e. parental abduction, missing from education and immigration cases.

23. Parental abductions are reported and investigated as a crime, however a missing person record is also created for the purposes of cross match searching against any unidentified person or body found. These cases can be difficult to solve, particularly in cases where the children are removed from the UK.

24. Operation Compass further explored the issues relating to children missing education. Independent research shows that children looked after by the local authority are over-represented in the cohort of children who go missing from school. Operation Compass again worked closely with the LCPC to develop a Procedure for ‘safeguarding children missing from school’. In the majority of the long term missing cases, the family has left the area and the child has not been registered at a new school. Operation Compass ensured every case of a child missing from school is risk assessed and where necessary reported to the police.

25. Each year the MPS receive reports of missing foreign nationals from agencies such as Immigration Nationality Department (IND), Social Services or Housing Departments. Issues relating to attempts to seek residency in the UK often complicate the circumstances in which the individuals have gone missing. It is however recognised that these circumstances may increase their vulnerability whilst making the case harder to solve. Some of these cases relate to families with children or unaccompanied children who have entered the UK. In order to address these concerns a partnership group has been set up by and led by the Home Office with representatives from the Metropolitan Police, the Police National Missing Person Bureau and the Immigration Nationality Department.

26. Detective Chief Superintendent Norman (VCD) working to Commander Jarman leads on the development of the MPS response to dealing with children abused through sexual exploitation (CATSE). These young people, normally female, typically come to police attention by being repeatedly reported as missing persons. It appears more than half of sexually exploited children are in local authority care. The abuse of these children is not intra- familial and therefore falls outside the established remit of the Child Abuse Investigation Command. Furthermore, the exploitation normally by adult ‘boyfriends’ is not organised or commercial and therefore normally falls outside the remit of the MPS Clubs and Vice Unit. It therefore, falls to Boroughs to deal with this issue.

27. Barnados publish their own research in 2005 and made a number of recommendations to partner agencies to improve the multi agency approach to tackling this complex form of abuse.

28. The MPS undertook to identify a single point of contact in each Borough for CATSE matters. In practice however, Barnados only have two projects for CATSE children in London, at Islington and Croydon. These two projects accept referrals of young people from the boroughs of Camden, Islington, Hackney, Haringey, Croydon, Lambeth and Southwark. The MPS have invested a full time constable to work alongside the Barnados project in Islington. This is leading to the development of standard operating procedures for partnership work between the MPS and Barnados.

29. It is envisaged that the good practice developed from this partnership will be available for the 25 London Boroughs who do not have the benefit of a Barnados project in respect of CATSE. At present, the single point of contact (SPOC) on each Borough for CATSE matters is a responsibility within the Borough Intelligence Unit. When the arrangements for Every Child Matters (ECM) are in place (see below) the SPOC for CATSE on each Borough will be the Missing Persons Unit.

30. Although not specifically identified as a policing priority tackling the sexual exploitation of children should be at the centre of all agencies commitment to ECM.

Every Child Matters development work

31. The MPS established an Every Child Matters (ECM) Programme Board in September 2005. This is chaired at ACPO level and attended by senior MPS officers. An Operation Compass representative attends, to ensure missing children are incorporated into the ECM strategy.

32. On a Borough level, a member of the Senior Management Team (SMT) is the police representative on the LSCB.

33. ECM places a responsibility on all statutory partners to record and share information on young people under 18 who come to notice in respect of issues that may adversely affect the child’s ability to achieve any of the five key outcomes which are: Be Healthy; Stay Safe; Enjoy and Achieve, Make a Positive Contribution, Achieve Economic Well Being. The initial recording of this information will be called a ‘pre assessment check’ (PAC).

34. It is anticipated that police will generate an average of 400 pieces of new information per borough per week that will need to be assessed and where appropriate shared with partners. In turn, the MPS on each Borough will receive information from partners about young people, which police will need to consider and act on where necessary. This new responsibility will require at least two new posts on each Borough in London. This will require significant resource realignment. Whilst this is not directly the result of missing persons, it is anticipated that there will be a considerable increase in the number of missing persons brought to the notice of police through pre-assessment checks (see paragraph 6 and 7).

35. As 60% of all missing person reports concern children dedicated staff working on Missing Person Units will receive specific training. The ECM training needs analysis has therefore nominated these staff for Level two training. This will be delivered through the multi agency training that is being created on behalf of the LSCBs through each Local Authority training unit.

36. Initial investigating officers will receive Level 1 ECM training which will detail the need to complete a pre-assessment check list that links into the common assessment framework (CAF). Through this process, the initial officer will be able to identify any other issues affecting the child, within or outside the home environment, and any siblings.

37. Two ECM awareness seminars have been held for Borough SMT representatives, this has included a specific input concerning the issues around missing persons. Operation Compass staff deliver the missing person input to the Detective Inspector course and the Inspector foundation course.

38. Operation Compass has developed, in partnership with the Information Sharing Support Unit (ISSU), an ‘Information sharing guidance for Missing Person Units’. This is to provide guidance for MPU staff when they receive requests for information about missing persons, from outside agencies and ensures they comply with the MPS requirements. Much of the information requested will relate to young people.

39. It is apparent that an increasing number of missing person investigations have their roots in cases of violence in the name of honour (HBV) and forced marriage (FM) issues. There are generally two circumstances when HBV and FM cases come to police notice via missing persons reports. One can be where someone reports the victim as missing fearing that they have been a victim of so called honour based violence or have been taken abroad by their family, for the purpose of forced marriage. The other is where a subject leaves the family home fearing HBV or FM and the family report them missing to establish their whereabouts with the intention of restoring family honour, by whatever means at the families disposal. There is clear guidance to officers not to disclose the missing persons whereabouts in these circumstances due to the substantial risks involved.

40. At the time of writing this report, 95% of TP officers have undertaken the mandatory DV training for constable to Inspector rank. An element of this training included an input on HBV and FM issues. The MPS Crime Academy is developing three seminars in relation to HBV. The second seminar will be targeted at secondary investigating officers such as Missing Person Unit (MPU) Borough staff in order to give them a greater understanding and awareness of HBV issues.

41. As part of the VCD daily management meetings the MIB proactively look for HBV and FM cases. If identified further support is offered to Boroughs via the Operation Compass and Community Safety Units Service Delivery Teams. If necessary support can be offered to Boroughs via the VCD’s Critical Incident Advisory Team.

42. London Councils commissioned Barnardos to evaluate services for young people who run away in London and a report was produced in August 2006. As a result a partnership project, to which Operation Compass contribute, has been set up with the aim of:

• Setting up a database of need and services in London Boroughs.
• Specific action to London Boroughs through joint commissioning London wide services.
• Supporting young people both at risk of (pre-intervention) and those who run away (preventing repeat episodes) through supporting families.

43. The MPS has commissioned research into whether children who come from homes affected by domestic violence are more likely to go missing. Further work in this area will be carried out.

C. Legal implications

There are no legal implications to report.

D. Race and equality impact

1. The incidence of missing person reports affects all communities, ages and genders across London. The missing person policy is monitored for equality impact assessment.

2. A significant number of missing persons are children and the Equalities Impact Assessment (EIA) for the Every Child Matters programme will consider people under 18 years as a distinct group.

3. The MPS annual statistics published for 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006 give a breakdown for gender and age in Table 1. Merlin cannot provide a break down of this data by ethnic origin. The MPS figures are currently being produced for missing persons 1 April 2006 to 31 March 2007 and the data on ethnicity will be extracted and published as soon as this has been completed. This is now possible due to enhancements made to the Merlin system.

Table 1 – Missing Person statistics 1 April 2005 to 31 March 2006 by age and gender

E. Financial implications

1. The Every Child Matters Programme Board chaired by Commander Jarman has two project strands for people and IT systems. It is anticipated that the IT systems strand will incur no additional costs. The people strand will recommend that every Borough in London creates a single point of contact to deal with referrals in respect of ECM. The asset invested in this will be different from Borough to Borough. There will need to be a reallocation of resources within TP and VCD to manage the requirements of ECM and also the strategic challenges detailed within this paper. It is too soon to say how much resource realignment will be required although a detailed assessment is underway within the project strand above. Commander Jarman will update the MPA as soon as specific implications are identified.

2. The MPS has invested heavily in Merlin but as detailed within this report it is reaching the limits of its development potential. In consequence there is now a fully funded project being co-ordinated between VCD and DoI to find replacement IT system(s) to meet the business need presently addressed by Merlin.

F. Background papers

None

G. Contact details

Report author: Ann Simpson Detective Inspector, Operation Compass, Violent Crime Directorate, MPS.

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

Appendix 1

Missing person training

Operation Compass has worked with staff from all the following areas to ensure Missing Person Investigations are included and where necessary revised to fully reflect the Standards Operating Procedures (SOP)

Probationers (Recruit/Initial Police Learning Development Course)

Lesson notes rewritten and lesson updated. 
Delivery commenced in August 2005. 
A pilot public protection seminar will be held in July 2007, this will include a missing person presentation.

Borough Training

A comprehensive training package was delivered to all Borough training units in February 2006 and is being rolled out to officers throughout the MPS.
Training targets: Uniform or detective police officers and supervisors involved with the investigation of missing persons, control room staff and Station Reception Officers (SROs)

Station Reception Officers

New staff receive vocational training and must complete an evidence-based workbook, which includes the reporting of missing persons. 
Current SROs will attend the borough training.

Control Room Call handlers

The Metcall course, The Police Staff Foundation course and the CAD course delivers relevant training.

Police Staff Foundation course

New members of police staff receive this course and it includes an input for missing persons.

Sergeant Foundation Course

All Sergeants, on promotion, receive a lesson on missing persons.

Inspectors Foundation Course

All Inspectors, on promotion, receive a lesson on missing persons - training unit staff and Operation Compass staff deliver this jointly.

CID Staff

The DC Investigators Foundation Course has a missing person element.
The DI’s course receives a missing person presentation from Operation Compass.
Crime Managers receive the Borough training package and attended a Specialist Missing Person Unit seminar.

The Senior Investigating Officer course has a missing person element in case studies of murders and in the practical phase of the course.

Specialist Missing Person Training

Operation Compass and the Training Standards Unit designed two stand alone, Specialist Missing Person training courses. This included specialist input for:

• Intelligence gathering,
• Searching,
• Children missing from care,
• Persons missing from psychiatric settings,
• The role of MAPPA,
• National Missing Persons Help Line,
• The Police National Missing Persons Bureau.

The training was compulsory for officers working in missing persons units and their immediate supervisors.

An invitation to attend was also extended to DIs and DCIs with a responsibility for missing persons on their BOCU.

This seminar will be repeated as necessary due to staff changes.

Special Constabulary

It is not possible to add a missing person module to the current Home Office initial training for the MSC.

A package was prepared by Operation Compass and delivered to the MPS Commander with a lead for the MSC.

Appendix 2

Young runaway 2005 research

1. How many incidents involving children under 18 were reported missing in the MPS, between January – December 2005? (Broken down by Local Authority areas)

The following table shows the number of incidents recorded per London Borough during 2005.

2. How many incidents involved repeat runaways?

There were 1921 incidents that involved repeat runaways. These incidents have been broken down into the number of times any one child has gone missing in 2005, see table below. For example 839 different children were each reported missing twice, one child was reported missing 68 times.

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