LOSING THE DETECTIVES: VIEWS FROM THE ... - Police Federation

We still suffer abstractions because the force hasn’t got the
capability of dealing with Level 2 criminals with the squads it has
got.
We supply the Murder Squad with additional people to support them
because, even though they’re bigger than probably any of our GO
CID teams combined yet they still cannot support their own work.
If there’s is an anti-terrorism operation they have carte blanche to
take staff. All it needs is a phone call 'I want your Tier 5 advisors,
your Tier 3 interviewers, whoever’s available, we’re having them'.
Off they go. There’s no thought of backfills, so straight away for a
relatively small office such as ours the loss of one person, it’s a
third of the strength of our team straight away.
When members of the GO CID teams are called away to assist they can be asked to
perform a specific role such as Exhibits Officer or Family Liaison Officer. This
increases the cost of the original abstraction because they are required to accept
follow-up work associated with that role after they have returned to their teams. In
fact the dual role commitment can continue right through to the trial stage.
I was called in as an Exhibits officer on a couple of murders and I
am stuck with it. The Major Incident Team have moved on to other
jobs but I am left with it. 'We’re onto something new now, we’ll leave
it with you'.
Family Liaison Officers come from the [GO] CID. The Major Incident
Team never say, 'That’s it, you’re done now' until you’ve been with
it all the way. I’m still involved as the Family Liaison Officer for the
first murder this year [four months earlier] and I interviewed on a
second one. So what has now landed on my desk are all the tapes
and transcripts to read through and check. I am going to have to
find time to do it because the job will have to be done, and quickly,
as all of them are subject to time restraints. Those are the sorts of
things that keep coming in, yet you’re expected to do your normal
job at the same time.
BCU-level abstractions
Commanders have also moved detectives from their local GO CID teams to form
specific BCU-based enquiry teams or to occupy posts created specifically to improve
performance.
In this respect the BCU structure mirrors the position at force level and, as with
forces, it was found that the extent of squad specialisation varies across BCUs. For
example, Volume Crime Units which had been in existence in other forces for over a
year had just been introduced on one BCU on the week of the focus groups.
Local abstractions onto specialist crime and enquiry teams
Commanders have selected experienced detectives to work in and, in some
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