The Bichard Inquiry - Report - Digital Education Resource Archive ...

1.358 If Humberside Police had received a fax query in December 2001, they
would have interrogated CIS Nominals, the only system against which
vetting queries were searched at the time. However, Humberside Police
have established that Huntley’s CIS Nominals record was not looked at
between 1 December 2001 and 15 January 2002. They cannot check
whether a search was done against the name ‘Ian Nixon’, because if no
record exists to start with, there is no audit trail.
Extremely unlikely that a fax was sent
1.359 Chief Constable Lloyd has accepted that it is more likely than not that no
fax was sent. Because of this acceptance, the Inquiry did not question any
Humberside Police witnesses about whether the fax was sent. On the basis
of the facts now known, as set out above, I consider that it is possible to go
further than the Chief Constable and I have concluded that it is extremely
unlikely that any ‘foreign force’ fax was sent by Cambridgeshire CRB in
respect of Huntley. My reasons are as follows.
1.359.1 The only fax which was sent to Humberside Police during this period
was on 23 December 2001 at 13:15.
1.359.2 The delay between the PNC check at 20:15 on 21 December 2001
and the sending of the fax on 23 December suggests that it was not
sent as a result of Mrs Giddings having noticed the need to send
a ‘foreign force’ fax at the time, which, according to a number of
witnesses, would have happened by the following shift at the latest.
1.359.3 Mr Causer’s usual practice was to carry out all checks on an
application form at the same time. He conducted no other checks
against Huntley at this time. It is therefore unlikely that he would
have reviewed the Police Check Form and identified the need to
send a fax to Humberside Police.
1.359.4 Ms Nicholson closed the file at 21:35 on 23 December 2001. At that
time no response to the fax of 13:15 earlier that day could have
been received. This would suggest that neither the paper file nor
the database were endorsed to the effect that any such fax had
been sent.
1.359.5 No search was undertaken by Humberside Police during the
relevant period against the name ‘Huntley’. There is no reason to
assume that there would not have been a search if a request had
been made.
1.359.6 It is extremely unlikely that a request was made and a search
undertaken only against the name of ‘Ian Nixon’, given that:
– the fax would have contained both names; and
– there is no reason to assume that Humberside Police would have
made the same mistake of searching under only one name, as
Cambridgeshire CRB did when searching the PNC.
The Bichard Inquiry – Contacts, recruitment and vetting – the facts 73