FOI 828/25
FOI 828/25
Request
- Ethnicity of suspects charged in cases of multi-offender child sexual offences
What I’m requesting: Ethnicity data on suspects charged with a sexual offence or offences against a victim or victim aged under 18 at the time of the offence, where the case involved two or more offenders or suspected offenders, broken down as follows:
- Number of Asian suspects charged
- Number of Black suspects charged
- Number of White suspects charged
- Number of Other Ethnicity suspects charged
- Number of suspects charged where ethnicity is Unknown
Please indicate whether suspects’ ethnicity is recorded based on self-defined ethnicity, ethnic appearance data or other criteria.
Timeframe: Suspects charged in the last three calendar years (January 2022 to January 2025). If that is not possible, please provide information on suspects charged in the last three financial years (March 2022 to March 2025). If that is not possible, please provide the most recent 12 months’ of data that you can retrieve.
- Ethnicity of suspects in ongoing cases of multi-offender child sexual offences
What I’m requesting: Ethnicity data on suspects in all cases involving two or more offenders or suspected offenders of sexual offences against a victim or victims aged under 18 at the time of the offence that were ongoing as of 17 June 2025, broken down as follows:
- Number of Asian suspects
- Number of Black suspects
- Number of White suspects
- Number of Other Ethnicity suspects
- Number of suspects where ethnicity is Unknown
Please indicate whether suspects’ ethnicity is recorded based on self-defined ethnicity, ethnic appearance data or other criteria.
- Ethnicity of charged suspects in cases flagged as group based child sexual exploitation
What I’m requesting: Ethnicity data on suspects charged in cases flagged as “group based child sexual exploitation”, or the closest equivalent term used by your police force, broken down as follows:
- Number of Asian suspects charged
- Number of Black suspects charged
- Number of White suspects charged
- Number of Other Ethnicity suspects charged
- Number of suspects charged where ethnicity is Unknown
Please indicate whether suspects’ ethnicity is recorded based on self-defined ethnicity, ethnic appearance data or other criteria.
Timeframe: Suspects charged in the last three calendar years (January 2022 to January 2025). If that is not possible, please provide information on suspects charged in the last three financial years (March 2022 to March 2025). If that is not possible, please provide the most recent 12 months’ of data that you can retrieve.
- Asylum status of suspects charged in cases of multi-offender child sexual offences
What I’m requesting: Asylum status of suspects charged with a sexual offence or offences against a child victim or victims, where the case involved two or more offenders or suspected offenders, broken down as follows:
- Number of suspects who were seeking asylum in the UK at the time of charge
- Number of suspects who were neither seeking asylum at the time of charge, nor were known to have previously sought asylum in the UK
- Number of suspects who had been granted asylum in the UK at the time of charge
- Number of suspects who had been refused asylum in the UK at the time of charge
Timeframe: Information on suspects charged in the last three calendar years (January 2022 to January 2025). If that is not possible, please provide information on suspects charged in the last three financial years (March 2022 to March 2025). If that is not possible, please provide the most recent 12 months’ worth of data that you can retrieve.
Response
Your request for information has now been considered and I am not obliged to supply the information you have requested.
In relation to your request, the following exemption applies:
Section 12(2) – The cost of compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit
Section 12(2) states: “…Subsection (1) does not exempt the public authority from its obligation to comply with paragraph (a) of section 1(1) unless the estimated cost of complying with that paragraph alone would exceed the appropriate limit.”
I can confirm that the cost of determining whether any information relative to this request is or isn’t held is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond therefore we are withholding the whole of the requested information since we consider that the Section 12 (2) exemption the Cost of Compliance exceeds the Appropriate Limit applies to it.
In relation to Q4 a search has been conducted using our record Management System (Niche RMS) for all crimes whereby a person has been charged with offences under ONS groups ‘Other serious sexual offences’ and ‘Other sexual offences’ and where the victim is under 18 years of age. This search yielded 358 outcomes between 1st January 2022 and 31st December 2024.
The data you have requested is not routinely collated in the format that would easily answer your query, therefore, to accurately answer your request we would need to individually interrogate all outcomes as Niche does not capture either 'asylum seeker' or 'refugee' as a personal category. All outcomes would also have to be reviewed to see if there was one or multiple offenders.
Whilst I cannot quantify exactly how long this would take it would most certainly exceed the 18 hours stipulated by the regulations to provide the data requested.
It is estimated that the cost of providing you with the information is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond i.e., the cost of locating and retrieving the information exceeds the "appropriate level" as stated in the Freedom of Information (Fees and Appropriate Limit) Regulations 2004.
In the case of the police service, the appropriate limit is £450 which has been calculated to equate to a total of 18 hours of work.
In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act 2000, this letter acts as a refusal notice.
Excess cost removes the forces obligation under the Freedom of Information Act, however under Section 16 – Duty to provide advice and assistance, an authority is required to offer an applicant the opportunity to redefine their request within the cost limit. If you were to remove question 4, we may be able to assist you with your request but please be advised that further exemptions may apply.