Victims of crime aged 80 + (418A/22)
Request
Q1: How many people aged 80 and over have been victims of crime in the West Midlands since the start of 2019.
Q2: For each case, I would like details of the victim’s age, gender, the area they live (town/city) and the crime that was reported and the outcome of the case.
Q3: I would like the incidents to be broken down by each year up to the present day.
Q4: Where further details of crimes can be disclosed please they be included (for example, if it was fraud can detail of how much money was lost be included).
Response
Please find enclosed and attached (418A/22 attachment):
Please note that due to a change in recording systems the data is split into two different periods:
Period 1: 1-1-2019 to 31 -03-2019
Period 2: 1-4-2019 to 7-4-2022
Q1: How many people aged 80 and over have been victims of crime in the West Midlands since the start of 2019.
9406
Q2: For each case, I would like details of the victim’s age, gender, the area they live (town/city) and the crime that was reported and the outcome of the case.
Our data are not organised in such a way as to allow us to provide this information within the appropriate (cost) limit within the Freedom of Information (FOI) Act (see ‘Reason for Decision’ below).
Although excess cost removes the force’s obligations under the Freedom of Information Act, as a gesture of goodwill I have supplied information, relative to your request, retrieved before it was realised that the fees limit would be exceeded (Please see attachment 418A/22.). I trust this is helpful, but it does not affect our legal right to rely on the fees regulations for the remainder of the request.
The data has been presented in Neighbourhood Policing areas and not town/city, as to locate the exact town / city for each offence would exceed the time limitations within the FOI Act.
Please note that this data should be interpreted with caution – as you can see on the Q2 period 2 data there appears to be a person aged 121 years old. This is highly unlikely to be correct as worldwide there are not many 121-year olds. This would have been entered in error.
Q3: I would like the crimes to be broken down by each year up to the present day
Please see attachment (418A/22 attachment)
Q4: Where further details of crimes can be disclosed please they be included (for example, if it was fraud can detail of how much money was lost be included).
Your request for this information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.
We can confirm that some relevant information is held by West Midlands Police.
The withheld information is exempt by virtue of the following exemptions
Section 40 (2) personal data
Section 40(2) is an absolute and class-based exemption if to release the information exists would breach the third party’s data protection rights. In this case to release this personal information would not constitute fair processing of the data. As this exemption is class based I am not required to identify the harm in disclosure and in this instance, I believe that the right to privacy outweighs any public interest in release
Any further details regarding these incidents are exempt by the following:
Section 40 (2) – Personal information
These exemptions and explanatory notes are shown here:
Please note that these data should be interpreted with caution. Comparing numbers of incidents/crimes can be misleading and does not necessarily indicate the likelihood of someone being a victim of crime. In addition, the number of incidents/crimes recorded in an area over a period of time can be influenced by a number of factors. Consequently, statistics on incidents/crimes for one period may not necessarily be a good indicator of future incidents in that area.
Every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that these data have been extracted from a number of data sources used by forces for police purposes. The detail collected to respond specifically to your request is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording system. As a consequence, care should be taken to ensure data collection processes and their inevitable limitations are considered when interpreting those data.
The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of relevance of data to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures for ad hoc requests may have limitations and this should be considered when those data are used.
If you decide to write an article / use the enclosed data we would ask you to take into consideration the factors highlighted in this document so as to not mislead members of the public or official bodies, or misrepresent the relevance of the whole or any part of this disclosed material.