Lincolnshire Police
About this force
| Area | 2,284 square miles |
|---|---|
| Recording stop and account? | Yes |
| Force website | Visit website |
About the PCC in this area
| Police & Crime Commissioner | Marc Jones (Conservative) |
|---|---|
| Email address | lincolnshire-pcc@lincs.pnn.police.uk |
| PCC website | Visit website |
How many searches do police do?
April 2016 – March 2017
The police conducted 2,601 stop and searches under PACE Section 1 across the area covered by Lincolnshire Police.
This was a reduction of 29% from the previous year.
There were 1 stop and searches under Section 60 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act, a power which doesn’t require individual reasonable suspicion.
This was a reduction of 99% from the previous year.
April 2015 – March 2016
The police conducted 3,675 stop and searches under PACE Section 1 across the area covered by Lincolnshire Police.
This was a reduction of 38% from the previous year.
There were 317 stop and searches under Section 60 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act, a power which doesn’t require individual reasonable suspicion.
This was an increase of 3422% from the previous year.
Stop and account
Lincolnshire Police record stop and accounts.
Lincolnshire is one of only nine police forces in England and Wales that record stop and accounts.
In 2013/14, a total of 1,314 recorded stop and accounts where carried out across Lincolnshire. Of these:
- 1,257 were of whites
- 8 were of blacks
- 6 were of Asians
- 8 were of people from mixed backgrounds
- 1 was of someone from a Chinese or other background
The numbers of accounts of those from non-white backgrounds are too low to provide any meaningful figures on stop and account disproportionality.
What are searches targeted at?
| Target | Proportion of searches |
|---|---|
| Drugs | 60% |
| Stolen property | 14% |
| Going equipped | 11% |
| Offensive weapons | 7% |
| Other | 6% |
| Criminal damage | 1% |
| Firearms | 1% |
How effective are police stop and searches?
Most searches conducted by police officers in Lincolnshire are for drugs rather than more serious or violent crime. In recent years, 60% of all searches were for drugs.
April 2016 – March 2017
12% of stop and searches conducted under PACE Section 1 lead to an arrest.
April 2015 – March 2016
8% of stop and searches conducted under PACE Section 1 lead to an arrest.
1% of stop and searches conducted under Section 60 Criminal Justice & Public Order Act lead to an arrest.
Who is getting searched?
Disproportionality has increased in Lincolnshire in recent years and despite the overall reduction in stop and search across the police force area and nationally. In 2016/17, black people were stopped and searched at over 4 and a half times the rate of white people across Lincolnshire (up from 3 times) and people from mixed backgrounds or Chinese or other ethnicities were searched at one and a half time the rate of whites. People from white or Asian ethnicities were under-represented in searches.
After a major expansion in 2015/16 in the use of section 60, a power that does not require officers to suspect a person is carrying a weapon in order to search them, there was a huge reduction in their use in from 317 down to only 1 in 2016/17.
PACE disproportionality ratios
| Ethnic groups | Ratio |
|---|---|
| White : Black | 1 : 4.7 |
| White : Asian | 1: 0.9 |
| White : Mixed | 1: 1.4 |
| White : Other | 1 : 1.5 |