Senior Officers and Staff with Criminal Record

Request: FOI/13393

Category: Discipline, Complaints and Legal Discipline

Subject: Senior Officers and Staff with Criminal Record

Your request for information has now been considered. In respect of Section 1(1)(a) of the Act we can confirm that the Police Service of Northern Ireland does hold information to which your request relates. The decision has been taken not to supply the information you have requested and the reasons for this are set out in more detail below. We have also provided you with links to guidance issued by the Information Commissioner’s Office which we have followed in responding to your request.

Request
How many members of the senior PSNI officers and staff CC, DCC, the 4 ACC ranks and 4 civilian heads have any criminal record. This includes any fixed penalty notices, Community Resolution notices or convictions through the court systems?

Answer
This request relates to a small number of individuals, whose names will be already known. To confirm or deny that this information is held would have the risk that it could be attributed to one of them, and potentially be a compromise of their personal information.

Section 17(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 requires the Police Service of Northern Ireland, when refusing to provide such information (because the information is exempt) to provide you the applicant with a notice which:

    a. states that fact,

    b. specifies the exemption in question and

    c. states (if not otherwise apparent) why the exemption applies.

The exemption is listed below:

Section 40(5B)(a)(i) – Personal Information
The duty to confirm or deny does not arise if to do so would contravene any of the data protection principles.

The full text of exemptions can be found at www.legislation.gov.uk and further guidance on how they operate can be located on the Information Commissioners Office website www.ico.org.uk.

Section 40 is a Class-based exemption, therefore it is not necessary to evidence the harm caused by disclosure nor is it necessary to carry out a public interest test in this case.
 
Neither Confirm nor Deny’ (NCND)
There may be occasions when complying with the duty to confirm or deny under section 1(1) (a) would in itself disclose sensitive or potentially damaging information that falls under an exemption. In these circumstances, the Act allows a public authority to respond by refusing to confirm or deny whether it holds the requested information.

The decision to issue a ‘neither confirm nor deny’ response is not affected by whether we do or do not hold the information but relates to the consequences of confirming or denying the information is held. The starting point and main focus in most cases will be theoretical considerations about the consequences of confirming or denying that a particular type of information is held. The decision to neither confirm nor deny is separate from a decision not to disclose information and needs to be taken entirely on its own merits.

PSNI follow the Information Commissioner’s Guidance in relation to ‘NCND’ and you may find it helpful to refer to this at the following link:

https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guidance-index/freedom-of-information-and-environmental-information-regulations/when-to-refuse-to-confirm-or-deny-holding-information/

Section 40(5B)(a)(i) - Personal Information
The release of information under Freedom of Information (FOI) is a release into the public domain and not just to the individual requesting the information. Once information is disclosed by FOI there is no control or limits as to who or how the information is shared with other individuals, therefore a release under FOI is considered a disclosure to the world in general.

To confirm or deny that PSNI hold or do not hold information could in fact confirm information about an individual. This would amount to a release into the public domain of personal information about an individual and likely to cause distress. The individual would have no expectation that these details would be released into the public domain; therefore PSNI would breach its data protection obligations and be unfair to individuals.

Whilst the PSNI would always wish to be transparent and accountable, no release under FOI should be made where an individual’s data protection rights would be breached. Not only would this be a breach of Data Protection legislation by the PSNI, but it would also leave the PSNI open to action against it by any individuals concerned.

However, this should not be taken as conclusive evidence that the information you requested exists or does not exist.