Cheshire Constabulary
About this force
| Area | 200 square miles |
|---|---|
| Recording stop and account? | No |
| Force website | Visit website |
About the PCC in this area
| Police & Crime Commissioner | David Keane (Labour) |
|---|---|
| PCC website | Visit website |
How many searches do police do?
April 2017 – March 2018
The police conducted 2,211 stop and searches under PACE Section 1 across the area covered by Cheshire Constabulary.
This was a reduction of 17% from the previous year.
There were 0 stop and searches under Section 60 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act, a power which doesn’t require individual reasonable suspicion.
April 2016 – March 2017
The police conducted 2,676 stop and searches under PACE Section 1 across the area covered by Cheshire Constabulary.
This was a reduction of 55% from the previous year.
There were 0 stop and searches under Section 60 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act, a power which doesn’t require individual reasonable suspicion.
Stop and account
Cheshire Constabulary do not record stop and accounts.
What are searches targeted at?
| Target | Proportion of searches |
|---|---|
| Drugs | 70% |
| Going equipped | 10% |
| Offensive weapons | 8% |
| Stolen property | 7% |
| Other | 4% |
| Criminal damage | 1% |
| Firearms | 1% |
How effective are police stop and searches?
A staggering 70% of all searches across Cheshire in 2017/18 was for drugs rather than directed serious or violent crimes, similar to the previous two years. This means that Cheshire police has one of the highest proportion of searches for drugs- most of which is likely to detect low-level possession of cannabis rather than drug dealers or the suppliers of harder drugs.
April 2017 – March 2018
18% of stop and searches conducted under PACE Section 1 lead to an arrest.
April 2016 – March 2017
8% of stop and searches conducted under PACE Section 1 lead to an arrest.
Who is getting searched?
Despite the overall reduction in recorded searches across Cheshire for the financial year 2017/18, black people were searched at just over seven times the rate of whites (up from just over four times previously). People from mixed backgrounds were searched at two and a half times the rate of whites (also an increase from double the rate in the previous year). Searches of Asian, Chinese and people from other ethnicities are slightly lower that that of white people.
Similar to previous years, there were no recorded searches under section 60, a power that does not require officers to have any suspicion that a person is involved in criminality before detaining them for a search.
PACE disproportionality ratios
| Ethnic groups | Ratio |
|---|---|
| White : Black | 1 : 7.0 |
| White : Asian | 1 : 0.6 |
| White : Mixed | 1 : 2.5 |
| White : Other | 1 : 0.8 |