3.4✅

• The police-social control responsibilities:

  • the police are the main agency for the detection, investigation + prevention of crime 
  • their work results in a huge volume of cases being brought to trial every year 
  • police forces have specialist departments, units + sections dealing w/ serious + complex cases such as terrorism
• The police-specialist policing:

  • the police are not the only agency responsible for investigating crime 
  • e.g. HM Revenue + Customs deals w/ tax evasion + Border Force deal w/ immigration offences 
• The police-offences of public concern:

  -> in recent years the police have made progress in prioritising some of the offences of concern to the public e.g. domestic abuse where increasing cases are being reported + recorded 

  -> e.g. 2017 annual report shows that 2/3 of domestic abuse practitioners (non-professionals who work closely w/ victims) felt the police’s approach had improved in the last 3 years 

  -> although this same report shows a lack in police performance on domestic abuse:

  • arrest rates has been falling 
  • staff shortages are causing delays in responding to incidents, putting victims at risk 
  • body worn video cameras are not always being used to gather evidence 

  -> these issues show that the police are not always successful in achieving social control 
• The police-inefficiency:

  • there are numerous criticisms of the police’s inefficiency or incompetence in investigating offences successfully 
  • e.g. Macpherson Report noted the failure of the Metropolitian Police to gather evidence + investigate leads in the murder of Stephen Lawrence that could’ve led to a successful prosecution of the 5 leading suspects in the case 
• The police-current trends:

  • according to the police’s own statistics = crime appears to be increasing e.g. the number of offences recorded by the police rose from 4.5m in March 2016 to 5.8m in June 2020
  • police statistics for certain crimes have increased significantly for example knife + gun crimes 
  • also police clear-up rates have been falling: in 2015: 15% of cases resulted in someone being charged w/ an offence, although by 2020 this fell to 7%
  • the number of penalty notices + cautions issued by police has also fallen 
• The police-dropped cases:

  • there is also evidence that the police are failing to investigate large numbers of offences reported to them including some serious ones 
  • over the 6 year period (2013-18) the Metropolitan Police screened out a total of 525,000 crimes on the same day as they were reported 
• The police-financial circumstances:

  • adequate funding is a major factor in the police achieving control over crime 
  • from 2010: the government made major cuts in the police budgets + this has been a cause for police decisions to drop investigations 
  • w/ limited budgets + fewer officers, some investigations + prevention measures have had to be prioritised over others 
• The police-accuracy of statistical evidence:

  • suggests that the police are becoming less effective in achieving social control, although police statistics need to be treated w/ caution for many reasons
• The police-improved recording procedures:

  • one reason for an increase in the total number of crimes could be because the police have become better at recording them 
  • 2014: the police statistics were deemed not to meet the standards required by the Office for National Statistics
  • the police have now made some efforts to improve crime recording e.g. domestic abuse = leading to more offences now appearing in the statistics 
• The police-counter evidence from the CSEW:

  -> the overall number of crimes may not be increasing 

  -> the Crime Survey for England + Wales (a survey of victims) shows that overall crime rates have leveled or fell instead of increasing 

  -> 1 reason for the difference between those 2 sets of statistics is that to some extent they deal w/ different crimes:

  • CSEW doesn’t include crims against business or crimes against children aged under 10 
  • police statistics tend to pick up more serious crimes (more likely to be reported) + ones where a police crime number is needed for insurance claims (e.g. burglary + vehicle theft)
• The police-other criticisms of police performance:

  -> police performance has been criticised in relation to other issues as well as clear up rates, one area of concern is race relations 
• The police-racism + bias:

  -> Macpherson Report (1999) into the number of Stephen Lawrence found that the Metropolitan Police was institutionally racist, since this there has been a-lot of interest into the relationship of the police to minority ethnic groups + concerns continue:

  • recruitment: of officers from minority ethnic backgrounds has increased, although these minority groups continue to be under-represented in the police force especially w/ senior ranks 
  • stop + searches: are used more against Black + other minority groups 

  -> the basic principle of policing in Britain is said to be policing by consent, if the police fail to have a positive relationship w/ all sections of the community based on consent + trust, this will hinder their ability to investigate + clear up crimes 
• The police-media reports:

  • there has been accusations of the police playing to the media to portray a ‘crimebusters’ image 
  • the police have also been criticised for over-reacting to media-driven moral panics + calls for crackdowns on whatever crime the media chooses to focus on 
  • drawing polices resrouces away from other areas of criminality that could be more serious or widespread 
• The CPS:

  -> the CPS acts as the main independent prosecutor for England + Wales, aiming to achieve social control by preparing cases + presenting them in court to secure the conviction of offenders
• The CPS-evidence of success:

  -> the CPS has had some success in achieving its aim, for example:

  • on average every 3 months: the CPS prosecutes around 80,000 cases in the Crown Courts + 450,000 cases in the magistrates court 
  • around 80% of the defendants that it prosecutes are convicted 
• The CPS-lack of effectiveness:

  -> despite the high proportion of convictions the CPS to some extent fails to achieve social control by sucessfully prosecuting offenders
• The CPS-media reports:

  • media reporting of the CPS’s performance has not always been favourable e.g. there has been criticisms of its handling of rape cases
  • in September 2018: The Guardian reported that the CPS’s specialist rape prosecutors has been advised to drop a number of supposedly ‘weak’ cases 
  • aiming to improve the CPS’s overall performance by ensuring that a higher proportion of its prosecutors would succeed
  • this move was criticised by experts + campaigners who warned that it would limit victims’ access to justice 
  • e.g. it could lead to cases involving younger victims and students being dropped as these were cases where the juries are shown to be less likely to convict 
• The CPS-realistic prospect of conviction:

  • the CPS’s Full Code Test includes the evidential test 
  • prosecutors have to be satisfied that there is a ‘realistic prospect for conviction’, meaning that the evidence is more likely than not to convince a jury to convict 
  • critics argue that the CPS should be focused less on trial outcomes + more on bringing cases to justice, the number of rapes reported rose by 1/3 from 2016-2020, although the number of prosecutions actually fell by 60%
• The CPS-budget cuts:

  • in recent years the CPS has suffered w/ budget cuts of 25% + lost 1/3 of their staff 
  • the CPS can’t sustain further cuts as digital technology is imposing heavy additional workloads onto its staff + the need to analyse content of smartphones in the search for evidence
  • there was one case that took 600 hours to analyse content on 1 phone 
• The CPS-evidence disclosure:

  • the number of rape + other prosecutions have collapsed due to the CPS + police’s failure to discover + disclose evidence e.g. text messages stored on victims’ or defendants’ phones 
• The CPS-failure to build the case:

  • in some high profile cases the CPS has failed to build an adequate case leading to the prosecution collapsing 
  • e.g. the murder of 10 year old Damilola Taylor: the CPS relied the whole case on an obviously lying witness, when proper checks would easily have established the unreliability of the evidence 
• The CPS-other criticisms of the CPS:

  • despite tis independent status, the CPS has been criticised for being too close to the police 
  • they have been criticised for being inefficient + slow when proceeding w/ cases, meaning that some victims + defendants have no choice but to put their lives on hold for potential months 
  • they fail to communicate w/ relevant parties, there have been some examples where suspects have only found out that the case is against them has been dropped through reading it in the media 
• The Judiciary-media images of the judiciary:

  • in the media: judges are often presented as old, white, upper-class males who are out of touch w/ modern society 
  • sometimes describing them as too soft, so they hand down lenient sentences for serious offences 
• The judiciary-are judges biased in their judgements?:

  • judges tend to come from unrepresentative sections of society, where they are sometimes suspected of making biased judgements as a result
• The judiciary-judges' backgrounds:

  • 68% of judges are male 
  • more than 1/2 of judges are aged over 50 
  • black, asian + minority ethnic groups are underrepresented: there are only 7% of judges who are from minority backgrounds 
  • higher class, they were either privately educated or went to oxford or cambridge 

  -> judges could be biased to people who are of similar backgrounds to themselves, or against people who are different to them 

  -> male judges are seen to have a lack of empathy for female victims of sexual assault 

  -> most offenders are young so its hard to know if age makes a different in a judge’s sentencing decisions 
• The judiciary-evidence of gender bias:

  • it is clearly present in certain cases 
  • e.g. Judge James Pickles: sentenced a man to probation after he was convicted of sexually assaulting a 6 year old girl 
  • later on that same year: Pickles jailed a woman for contempt of court (disrespecting the legal process) for refusing to give evidence against her ex-boyfriend who has assaulted her 
• The judiciary-currency:

  • while there have been cases of gender bias in the judiciary such as Pickles, these seem less common today than in the 1980s or 90s + could be less of a current concern 
  • although class bias continues to be current in some sentencing decisions such as the case of Lavinia Woodward 
• The judiciary-are judges out of touch?:

  • media stereotypes of judges often portray them as out of touch w/ mainstream modern society + especially w/ the public’s views of sentencing e.g. Pickles once said “Who are the Beatles?”
  • the age, education + class background of judges is likely to make them somewhat unconventional member of society, although whether they are ‘out of touch’ is harder to judge 
  • Karen Warner et al interviewed Australian jurors about judges (Australia has a similar justice system to the UK) = so they found that most jurors didn’t think that judges were out of touch w/ public opinion on sentencing 
• The judiciary-are judges out of touch?:

  • some who thought that judges were out of touch stated that it is not a criticism + also stated that it didn’t apply to the judge in the trial that they had been involved in 
  • jurors being either too in touch or too out of touch could also have issues as it could mean that the juror can be swayed or unduly influences by public opinion, moral panics etc 
  • out of touch = remaining independent 
• The judiciary-are judges too lenient?:

  -> some sections of the media state that judges are too lenient in sentencing offenders 
• The judiciary-the unduly lenient sentences scheme:

  • this scheme allows victims, prosecutors + members of the public to apply to the Attorney General or Solicitor General for a sentence to be reviewed if they feel it was unduly lenient 
  • it applies to sentences for serious offences such as murder, rape, robbery, child sex crimes + people trafficking 
  • if the minister agrees that the judge made a huge error in their sentencing decision then they will proceed to ask the Court of Appeal to review the sentence + if its needed = increase it 
  • few applications are made for sentenced to be reviewed = as in 2018: 140 cases were referred whilst only 99 had their sentences increased, in general judges are not being unduly lenient in their sentencing 
• The judiciary-unduly severe sentences:

  • there are examples of judges + magistrates imposing on what some regard as unduly severe sentences, as in many of the cases arising out of the 2011 riots, when offenders often received custodial sentences for minor theft offences 
• Prisons:

  • they aim to achieve social control by punishing offenders + by rehabilitating them so that they follow a crime-free life after they’re released 
  • they also aim to exercise social control over offenders while they are inside prison so that they follow the prison’s rules + behave in an orderly manner 
  • evidence suggests that prisons are not particularly effective in achieving their aims 
• Prisons-social control within prisons (evidence):

  • critics argue that the prison system is in crisis + that prisons are in many cases unable to exercise effective control over their inmates, the subheadings below support this view
• Prisons-staff cuts:

  • between 2010-2018: the number of prison officers fell by 15% as a result of budget cuts
  • more experienced officers were more likely to leave, leaving the less experiences officers to deal w/ the prisoners having it harder for them to maintain control over inmates as they don’t have that level of experience 
• Prisons-overcrowding:

  • prison population doubled from 43,000 in 1993 to around 80,000 in 2021
  • there are now more prisoners to control as well as overcrowded conditions for many inmates = 58% of prisons were overcrowded + therefore leads to the discontent + rule-breaking inside the prisons 
• Prisons-not addressing rehabilitation needs:

  • increased numbers of prisoners, staff shortages + budget cuts means that prisons are often unable to deal w/ the cause of prisoners’ offending including mental health needs, drug + alcohol dependency, illiteracy + lack of qualifications 
  • this is made worse as many prisoners are serving short sentences so there isn’t enough time to address these often complex needs 
• Prisons-a drugs epidemic:

  • drug use among prisoners has risen rapidly, most of the increase has been in the use of ‘new psychoactive substances’ (NPS) such as Spice
  • they are synthetically produced drugs + can be 100 times more potent than natural cannabis + can cause aggression, psychosis + intense depression, 117 deaths in prison have been linked to NPS use
  • the availability of drugs undermines prison discipline + control by reducing inmates’ participation in rehabilitation activities, creating debt among prisoners + increasing levels of violence 
• Prisons-security:

  • the most basic requirement of prison is to hold prisoners in custody, there have been almost no escapes from closed prisons since 2010 + few absconders from open prisoners
  • although there have been multiple breaches of security w/ drugs, sim cards + other forbidden items that have somehow been smuggled into prison sometimes through the use of drones 
• Prisons-safety:

  -> incidents of assaults, self-harm + suicide have risen, in 2020 there were:

  • 5 homicides 
  • 76 suicides 
  • self harm particularly high among women prisoners 
  • 9,800 assaults on staff