Poor Police Response Report: Disabled Victims of hate crime

Our Poor Police Response Report, published in November 2021, is on behalf of the London DDPO Hate Crime Partnership, comprised of 24 DDPOs across London offering different levels of hate crime support to Disabled victims of hate crime.

The launch of this report coincides with the International Day of Disabled People, 3rd December 2021

DDPOs told us that over the last six months trying to get police officers from the Metropolitan Police Service to take reports and investigate hate crimes had become particularly challenging.

Our key findings:

• In our survey, all the organisations supporting Disabled victims of hate crime said they had experienced a poor response from the Metropolitan Police with multiple cases.
• Poor responses were London-wide.
• Similar poor responses have been reported across the UK.
• Poor responses mean victims are less likely to report again.
• Disabled community have extremely low confidence in the police.
• Evidence to suggest Disablist attitudes held by police officers.

The report brings together an overview to provide context, the results of our survey, London-wide case studies, UK-wide experience, and our analysis that combined suggest a systemic failure by the Metropolitan Police and other UK police forces in their response to hate crime against Disabled victims. We then offer recommendations to improve outcomes for Disabled victims of hate crime when reporting to police.

Our recommendations:

For Police

• Reinstate Metropolitan Police Disability Hate Crime Matters Initiative.
• Make more use of the Metropolitan Police Disability Independent Advisory Group.
• All Borough Command Units (BCUs) to set up or make use of CPS Multi-agency Scrutiny Panels for hate crime case reviews via Hate Crime Coordinators (HCOPS).
• Support / set up a Community Multi-Agency Risk Assessment Conference (Community MARAC) in each BCU to deal with high risk and repeat Anti Social Behaviour (ASB) and hate crimes cases and other cases involving adults at risk.
• To make better use of local DDPOs via Communities Community Alliance To Combat Hate (CATCH) Partnership when responding to Disabled victims.
• To counter Disablism
  • Specialist Equality Training led by people with lived experience and proactive recruitment of Disabled Police Officers.
  • For recruitment processes to include personality assessments to ensure recruits have the right attitude and values to serve the public and marginalised groups.
•  Identify links between Anti-Social Behaviour / Neighbourhood disputes and hate incidents earlier.
• HCOPS to make use of Metropolitan Police Service new technology & software to identify hotspots, repeat incidents and link to safeguarding adult referrals and anti-social behaviour reports.

For the Crown Prosecution Service

• Prosecution of police officers dismissed for gross misconduct when involving Disabled people.
• Make a public statement and put procedures in place to actively seek prosecution of police officers who have been involved in inappropriate behaviour, exploitation and abuse against Disabled people.
• The CPS and MPS need to do more work together to understand the negative impact on the community if police officers who have assaulted, exploited or abused a Disabled person do not face criminal proceedings and to look at how those decisions are made and communicated to the Disabled community.

For the Mayor’s Office for Police & Crime (MOPAC)

• MOPAC commissioners to ringfence part of small grants scheme and fund more localised organisations led by Disabled people to support Disabled victims and raise awareness of hate crime within Disabled community in collaboration with the CATCH Partnership.
• Work with MPS Deputy Commissioner’s Delivery Group.

For the London Assembly Police & Crime sub-committee

• Prioritise hate crime against Disabled people to monitor progress and effectiveness of initiatives by MPS to improve reporting of Disability Hate Crime and Disabled victims level of satisfaction with how their cases are dealt with.

Thank you to the DDPOs involved in the partnership for providing their evidence and commitment to support Disabled victims of hate crime.

Download the report in PDF format on the following link:
Poor Police Response Report: Disabled Victims of hate crime

Reports and Resources

For more research and reports, please check out our Hate Crime Resources section.