Police chief calls for urgent guidance for forces after cover-up accusations
Warwickshire police and crime commissioner Philip Seccombe is calling for fresh national guidance to be issued after the charging of two men – reported to be Afghan asylum seekers – prompted accusations that the force withheld information about their immigration status.
The pair are accused of raping of a 12-year-old girl in Nuneaton.
Mr Seccombe said: 'Like all forces, Warwickshire Police finds itself in a difficult position of trying to carefully balance the legal safeguards which protect the integrity of the judicial process, while maintaining public order and simultaneously ensuring that public confidence is maintained through transparency and honesty.
'Currently police forces are in an invidious position when deciding what can and should be disclosed in sensitive cases, given that the national guidance is silent on both the ethnicity and immigration status of suspects.
'It is very easy to criticise and suggest that the balance of disclosure hasn't been correct, but it is much harder to take these decisions on the ground.'
On Wednesday, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said police should reveal more information about suspects, and that guidance to police was already being looked at.
But she added it was an 'operational decision' for forces and the Crown Prosecution Service over what information to release.
She said: 'However, we do think that the guidance needs to change, the College of Policing is already looking at this, and Home Office officials are working with the College of Policing.'
The Nuneaton case has led to fresh pressure on police over the information they make public.
The Southport atrocity committed by Axel Rudakubana in July last year was marked by a focus on the suspect's ethnicity and immigration status, with false rumours spreading online that he was a Muslim asylum seeker, fuelling riots after the stabbings.
Mr Seccombe added: 'It is imperative that police forces have revised guidance as soon as possible, so everyone has the clarity needed on what information will be released, when it will be released and by whom, for any incidents going forward.'
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