Calling missing persons among the “most challenging issues” for modern police forces, researchers from the University of Portsmouth have recently published two independent studies assessing the impact of police budget cuts on missing person investigations, as well as the impact of COVID-19 lockdown restrictions on missing person reports in the UK.
For several decades, the police service of England and Wales grew by nearly a third while the population only grew by 10%. Due to budget cuts, that growth halted in 2010. As of March 2018, there are 15% less police officers on the force than there were in March 2010. Additionally, the number of civilian staff has also decreased by 21% over the same time period.
To study this impact, if any, Mark Greenhalgh and Karen Shalev Greene employed an online survey to examine the perceptions of police officers and staff members on training needs, resources, quality of investigations and wellbeing. The researchers collected data from 373 police officers and staff working on missing person investigations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Officers of all ranks have deep concerns about the lack of training around missing persons investigations. According to the findings, 21% of officers and staff members investigating missing persons have not had any training at all, while 50% have not had training in more than two years. Only 23% received any specific missing person training.
This is especially concerning given that some officers reported working more than 30 missing persons cases per week. Additionally, according to the findings, participants in supervisory ranks are at increased risk of burnout due to the added responsibility of constantly reprioritizing risk, demand and resources.
“This level of pressure and workload is not manageable and can put missing persons at risk of harm,” write Greenhalgh and Greene.
The researchers say participants in their study showed overwhelming support for the establishment of a dedicated missing persons team for each police force. They also expressed interest in “getting upstream of the problem” by employing early identification and intervention with at-risk people.
“However, a clear majority of participants felt that their force did not have enough resources to be proactive in this way and are merely reacting to demand in a ‘revolving door’ fashion,” write the researchers. “Participants from forces with a missing person team were less likely to have this view. Therefore, having a dedicated team seems to lessen the impact of cuts and lack of resources.”
In another independent but related study, Greene worked with her colleagues to assess the extent to which COVID-19-induced lockdown in early 2020 impacted the profile of UK missing persons reports.
The team compared the characteristics of adult and children missing persons cases recorded by 6 UK police departments from March 23 to May 20, 2019 to the same time period in 2020 during lockdown.
As expected, the study found a substantial reduction in the overall number of missing persons during lockdown—a 35% decrease in missing children reports and 36% reduction in missing adult reports.
Comparing characteristics, children who were reported missing during lockdown were 5.8x more likely to be found 41 to 80 miles from where they went missing. Additionally, transgender children were 4.9 times more likely to go missing, while children from a black, Asian or minority ethnic background were 1.1 times more likely. Children who went missing in lockdown were missing for shorter periods, and were slightly older. In general, missing children were 1.5 times more likely to be classified as low-risk.
That differs from missing adults who were 1.3 times more likely to be deemed high risk, according to the study findings. Unsurprisingly, missing adults were also 1.8 times more likely to suffer harm in lockdown compared with 2019. They also were 1.3 times more likely to have suffered violent, racial, transphobic or domestic abuse, 1.23 times more likely to have relationship issues and 1.4 times more likely to be at risk of suicide/self-harm.
“Given that high risk adults and low risk children were more likely to go missing during lockdown, the level of risk assigned to missing individuals during lockdown should be explored more in-depth by forces, the researchers write.
The team from Portsmouth concludes that—for missing children especially—a multi-agency approach could help prevent repeat cases and offer support and aftercare.