a quick reflection… 1.do you think body worn video is a good idea? 2.do you think body worn video...
TRANSCRIPT
A quick reflection…
1.Do you think Body Worn Video is a good idea?
2.Do you think Body Worn Video affects Criminal Justice Outcomes for Domestic Abuse incidents?
3.Do you think officers would want to wear Body Worn Video?
Police, Camera, Evidence
The impact of Body Worn Video on the criminal justice outcome of domestic abuse incidents and next steps
Presented by: Catherine Owens
15 April 2015
CONTEXT
PRESSURE
• Criticised over domestic violence deaths
• Receive 85-95 calls of domestic abuse a day
• Very conscious Essex must get our
response right every single time - substantial risk
PRESSURE cont..
•Wanted evidenced based approach
•Sought innovative solution
•Old technology – successful?
oGreater support for victims & witnesses
oIncrease in positive disposals & early guilty pleas (quantity and quality of evidence)
oAccountability and confidence - officer
oReduction in offending behaviour due to officer presence and successful outcomes
THEORY OF CHANGE
Advantages of collaboration
For Essex:• Pilot BWV before
implementation - will it have the desired effect?
• Reduced risk to force
For the College:• Low-cost, naturally occurring opportunity for groundbreaking research• Build and test evidence on BWV, DA, and CJ outcomes
For the service as a whole…
Demonstrates the value of evidence-based policing
Do BWV cameras reduce attrition for domestic abuse incidents
through the CJ process?
• Launched trial - January 2014
• 308 response officers in Essex attended 7,609 domestic abuse incidents during the 4 month trial
INTERVENTION OUTCOME
• Chance?• Other factors? • Generalisable? • Negative outcomes?• Unintended consequences? • Comparisons between interventions…
– Best value? Most effective? Most efficient?
Establishing cause-and-effect…
What is a RCT?
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/test-learn-adapt-developing-public-policy-with-randomised-controlled-trials
Essex collaboration – BWV cameras
• 308 eligible response officers
− 80 randomly assigned to the treatment (cameras)− 238 randomly assigned to the control (no cameras)
Only 70 officers ended up wearing the cameras
• Minimising potential for contamination
− Sample stratified by location − Deployment to incidents is ‘blinded’− Single crewing policy− An analytical focus on the incident and the officer
• Outcomes
− The proportion of attended incidents resulting in arrest, charge & criminal conviction
− Also monitoring early guilty pleas & sentencing
Results – proportion of charges
• A significantly higher proportion of treatment group incidents resulted in one or more criminal charges than another Sanction Detection outcomes
Proportion of Detected Cases with Charges
Treatment Control
81% 72%
Results – proportion of charges
• Other explanatory factors were considered, and the camera effect was not associated with any particular geographic areas, demographics of officer, or risk factors
• This result was confirmed at the officer level, and at all levels of risk of incident….
Results – proportion of charges
• The results from this predictive model show the likely effect the camera would have in different cases (based on Essex data)
Risk Assessment
Proportion of Detected Cases Charged
Treatment Control Difference
Standard 57% 45% 12%
Medium 80% 72% 9%
High 99% 98% 1%
Officer feedback
• Quantity and Quality of evidence• Supporting Victims and Witnesses• Accountability• Confidence and Efficacy
Officer feedback
“picture paints a thousand words and a video paints a million…but if your pictures is blurry
then…”
Conclusions• BWV could be effective at increasing the
proportion of detections that were criminal charges
• Lots of implementation feedback• Evidence capture• Officer behaviour change• Practical limitations and low usage
• No effect for other CJ stages before detection but…– More likely to change with greater uptake?– Subject to other influences?
• Promising results for later CJ stages• Essex can have confidence in their approach• Opportunities – reflective practice
NEXT STEPS
• Innovation bid• Essex 400 cameras – Five policing
areas• Kent 1300 cameras• Operational go-live October 2014 –
Kent/Essex• Personal issue is the way forward• Clear guidance and policy
CULTURAL CHANGE
• Attitudes & behaviour
• Wider awareness – other officers / staff being filmed
Do BWV cameras improve police/public contact & increase the proportion of incidents that result in a CJ outcome?
• Very limited evaluation evidence on ‘what works’ to reduce complaints & improve use of S&S
• Quality of contact is an important issue – legitimacy & public cooperation
• BWV is a potential game-changer…
− Officer visibility to supervisors− After-the-event accountability− Reviewability of decisions
• The Rialto experiment
− A significant reduction in police use of force− A likely reduction in complaints
MPS collaboration – BWV cameras
• 10 boroughs selected from across the MPS
− Selection criteria: complaint rate (primary) and S&S rate
• Cluster randomised design
− 2 teams per borough randomly assigned to the treatmentAbout 500 officers with cameras
− 3 teams per borough randomly assigned to the controlAbout 750 officers without cameras
• Outcomes
− CJ outcomes – arrests, sanction detections, charges…− Complaints – number− S&S – number, hit rate, grounds & disproportionality− Officer attitudes & self-reported behaviour− Public attitudes & experience of contact?− Force assessment of cost-savings
MPS collaboration – BWV cameras
