Thematic inspection of police response to missing persons in Scotland

Context

7. The most recent inspection of police response to missing persons by HMICS was carried out in Aberdeen City and published in June 2015. The inspection report made 11 recommendations, most of which were for Police Scotland and the local division. It was recommended that Police Scotland work with Scottish Government to establish an agreed definition of missing persons and a consistent approach to risk assessment.

8. It was further recommended that Police Scotland should work with local authorities and local child and adult protection committees to develop more routine analysis and sharing of missing persons data to inform shared partnership tactical assessments. The remaining recommendations were, in the main, related to operational practices.

9. Subsequently, Scottish Government published a National Missing Persons Framework for Scotland (the framework). It was the first of its kind in Scotland and was developed through close collaboration between the Scottish Government, Police
Scotland, local authorities, NHS Scotland and a number of third sector organisations, including the charities Missing People, Barnardo's Scotland and Shelter Scotland.

10. The framework provides the following definition of a missing person, as agreed by partners to the framework. It also proposes a consistent response to low, medium and high-risk categories of missing persons with corresponding definitions.

A missing person is anyone whose whereabouts is unknown and:

• where the circumstances are out of character; or
• the context suggests the person may be subject to crime; or
• the person is at risk of harm to themselves or another.

The framework provides the following definitions of risk:

• High Risk: the risk posed is immediate and there are substantial grounds for believing that the missing person is in danger through their own vulnerability; or may have been the victim of a serious crime; or the risk posed is immediate and there are substantial grounds for believing that the public is in danger.
• Medium Risk: the risk posed is likely to place the missing person in danger or they are a threat to themselves or others.
• Low Risk: the apparent threat of danger to either the missing person or the public is low (a child should not be graded as low risk).

11. The framework sets out the roles and responsibilities of the respective agencies, as well as key national objectives and commitments on which to focus collective efforts on missing persons. It provides a basis for understanding the underlying issues relevant to missing episodes, and outlines its objectives of ‘prevention, respond, support and protect’. It also promotes the ongoing development of an effective frontline response when someone goes missing and encourages a preventative approach to reduce the number of people going missing in the first place.

12. A multi-agency group was established by Scottish Government to promote the implementation of the framework and to provide practical support to police and partners to meet agreed objectives. This is the framework implementation group,
referred to in this report as the implementation group. Scottish Government is reviewing the framework with the support of the implementation group to update it and include learning achieved since its initial publication.

13. The establishment of a multi-agency framework for missing persons is a particular strength in Scotland. There is no similar framework in place in other parts of the UK. This provides opportunities for policing and partnership working in Scotland in terms of strengthening collaboration on strategic planning, service delivery and working toward achieving the objectives of the framework.

14. The Scottish Government provides valuable support to promote missing persons policy and provides funding for national coordinators, hosted by a third sector organisation, Missing People, which operates across the UK. Scottish Government staff also undertake secretariat functions for the implementation group.

15. The national coordinators play a key role in raising the profile of the framework across police divisions and provide expert advice and support to police and partners to develop local partnership protocols and a collaborative operational service delivery.

16. The scale of missing person incidents in Scotland is considerable, with Police Scotland recording over 20,000 missing person reports on STORM in the year 2022/23. Following assessment, almost 18,000 missing person investigations proceeded and were recorded on the police NMPA in the same year.

17. The number of investigations reduced from almost 18,000 in 2022/23 to 16,236 in 2023/24. While this represents a significant reduction and positive trend, the number of missing incidents (and subsequent investigations) remain considerable.

18. It should be recognised that these figures include repeat missing investigations; this means that the number of people who are missing each year is fewer than the overall figure. The number of missing individuals reduced from reduced from just over 10,000 in 2022/23 to just over 9,000 in 2023/24. This highlights the challenge of addressing the issues related to repeat missing persons, which we refer to in detail in the delivery section of this report.

19. It should also be noted that the figure of 20,000 missing person reports on the police system during 2022/23 is dwarfed by the overall number of calls made to Police Scotland service centres by people concerned for an individual whom they believe may be missing. Approximately 40,000 such calls are made to the service centres each year.

20. This requires a skilled response from service advisors. They use risk assessments to differentiate between calls that most likely fit the criteria of a concern for person call and those that relate more explicitly to a missing person incident. Overall, service centre advisors carry out this task to a very high standard.

Underlying causes

21. A common consideration made within missing persons research literature relates to the typology of individuals reported missing and some of the underlying causes. The literature has tended to focus on the most vulnerable groups of individuals – such as children, those with mental health issues, or those with dementia. However, it is important to stress that there are a variety of complex reasons why an individual may
go missing and one person’s reasoning may differ greatly from another.

22. Such complex issues do not disappear once a missing person has returned, especially in situations where an individual returns to their previous situation/s without support to improve/address their circumstances. This can result in further
missing episodes.

23. A recent report by Missing People (2022) supported this idea, noting the presence of multiple challenges and pressures that may influence missing episodes, while suggesting that a missing episode could be symptomatic of a stressful situation for the individual.

24. An estimated 80,000 children go missing in over 210,000 reported incidents each year in the UK. Missing children are at significant risk of harm, although it is difficult to quantify what proportion come to harm while missing. Research by the Children’s Society found that 11% of missing children had been ‘hurt or harmed while away from home on the only or most recent occasion’. Other research has found that one in every eight young people reported missing had been physically hurt and one in nine had been sexually assaulted while away.

25. In Scotland, children and young people are reported missing more than any other category. A significant majority of missing person investigations relate to those aged 17 years and under.

26. Children who go missing and the causes of missing episodes in children are key points of interest in the academic literature. Maclean and Gillon, (2022) reported that children and young people in the 12-17-year-old age bracket had the largest number of missing episodes of any age group in Scotland, for the year 2020/2021. As outlined previously in this report, this trend has continued.

27. Some of the cited reasons relate to difficult family situations and neglect (Woolnough and Cunningham, 2020) or issues linked to bullying and difficulty following instructions at school (Maclean and Gillon, 2022). A recent analysis of risks and responses to missing children by Sidebottom et al. (2020) suggested that care experienced children and young people are over-represented in missing persons data. However, this may in part be due to reporting practices, with carers obliged to contact the police when a child in their care is missing.

28. A Missing People (2022) report states that the most common reasons adults go missing are linked to mental health, suicide and relationships with other people. It notes that going missing can exacerbate risk of harm, with 66% of returned missing adults disclosing that being missing had affected their mental health. Three in four adults who responded to a survey for the report disclosed experiencing harm while missing.

29. A recent report by Alzheimer Scotland focuses on those with dementia and outlines the potential risks for missing people with dementia, including potential exposure to dehydration, hypothermia, injuries and abrasions. Petillo (2023) reports that there are 90,000 people diagnosed with dementia in Scotland, with 40% reported missing at some stage.

30. Relatively recent research found there is a trend of under-reporting regarding missing person incidents by the families of individuals with dementia. Shalev, Greene, Clarke, Pakes and Holmes (2019) suggest that police forces in the United Kingdom are not fully aware of the scale of missing episodes in dementia patients.

31. Research conducted in England and Wales provided an estimate that up to 80% of adults who are reported missing have mental health issues, increasing the risk to their safety (Harrington et al., 2018).

32. Mental health issues were identified as the most commonly cited vulnerability experienced by adults reported missing (Missing People, 2022). Police Scotland provided statistics in Maclean and Gillon (2022) covering the year 2020/2021, which showed that 56% of male missing persons and 42% of female missing persons indicated poor mental health (it is likely these figures are higher, as this can be under-reported).

33. The families, carers and key contacts of missing persons can experience considerable upset and distress when a loved one goes missing, so the quality of the police response, engagement and communication with such groups is of high importance.

34. While most people either return by themselves, or are returned by police, the impact and distress caused to families and friends of the relatively small number of people who are not found, or who are not found alive, cannot be underestimated.

Demand profile

35. Missing person investigations are a priority for Police Scotland and, as stated, require a considerable level of commitment from across policing. However, given the high number of calls made to the service centres, and subsequent investigations, this places a significant demand on Police Scotland's resources. Figure 1 outlines the demand profile of missing person investigations recorded by police for the last three fiscal years, 2021/22, 2022/23 and 2023/24.

Figure 1 – Number of missing person investigations by fiscal year

36. A significant number of officers are needed to undertake investigations to trace people who are reported missing. In particular, the resource requirement for high and medium-risk missing person investigations has the potential to affect the ability of Police Scotland to deliver other policing priorities.

37. To illustrate this demand, it is estimated that the staff resource required to undertake missing person investigations is the equivalent of 900 full-time officers per year, as an average. This is a significant resource demand for a force the size of Police Scotland. Figure 2, below, demonstrates the level of officer resource required to respond to missing person investigations by risk level.

Figure 2 – Level of full-time officer equivalent demand by risk level

38. Police Scotland records missing person incidents on its STORM command and control system. In 2022/23, there were 20,658 missing person reports recorded on the STORM system, resulting in 17,917 missing person investigations. There are various reasons why incidents do not always result in a missing person investigation. For example, the missing person may return prior to the police being dispatched; a duplicate incident may have been created; or the individual may have been traced prior to investigation. Police Scotland has business rules regarding how this information should be recorded.

39. While there were minor inconsistencies in the way staff applied these business rules, we did not find evidence that such inconsistencies detracted from investigations being appropriately recorded on the NMPA. Inconsistencies can occur as a result of different interpretations of the business rules being applied, particularly regarding the recording of information on the application. Managers should continue to ensure that officers and staff are consistently recording incidents accurately to prevent an unreliable picture of missing people in Scotland.

40. Service advisors gathered good information from reports of high-risk missing persons, and we noted that, in most cases, they were appropriately inquisitive about the circumstances relating to people being reported missing (which has the potential to reduce demand). As Police Scotland correctly identifies in its Missing Person Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), its purpose is not to act as a tracing agency, but to find individuals where an element of risk has been identified. Staff should therefore be inquisitive, to identify those cases where risk is present, or can reasonably be assumed to be.

41. Information gathered by staff for high-risk investigations was good and risk assessments were applied appropriately to reports received by service advisors. However, through our call audit, we found service advisors could do more to gather valuable background information regarding low-risk missing persons, to potentially reduce demand on operational officers.

42. In some instances, cases that were transferred to area control rooms (ACR) could have been more fully explored by service advisors, particularly with partner agencies making a report. While we recognise the degree of time pressure placed on service advisors to deal with calls, there is benefit in pressing the reporter for all useful information, as well as querying the existence of protocols and whether they have been adhered to. For example, if they are reporting a person missing from a care facility, it is realistic to expect that the agency has followed their internal protocols to gather relevant information and to search for the individual within reasonable limits.

43. It was evident that demand on operational staff can, at times, be greater in rural areas. This can be as a result of differing access to specialist resources. Divisions in rural areas tend to rely more heavily on specialist partner organisations to assist them at the initial stages of an investigation. We acknowledge that any lack of access to specialist resources in the initial stages of an investigation is likely as a result of geography (and the time taken to get specialist resources to the area).

44. In 2019, Police Scotland created a missing person dashboard from information taken from STORM and the NMPA. Development of the dashboard has been a collaborative effort between the demand and productivity unit (DPU) and the NMPU. The aim of the dashboard is to allow police to identify both geographical and demographic information regarding missing person incidents, which includes the following information:

• location of incident
• age
• gender
• duration of incident
• repeat incidents
• number of people found safe and well
• number of people found deceased
• number of people still missing.

45. It is clear from data provided by Police Scotland that the majority of missing person investigations relate to children and young people aged 17 years and under. Figure 3 outlines the age ranges of individuals reported missing over the past three fiscal years.

Figure 3 – Number of missing person investigations by age group

46. The majority of children and young people are reported missing from home, although a significant number are also reported missing from residential childcare settings.

47. Police Scotland has also identified useful demographic data about other categories of individuals prevalent in missing persons reports, such as those with mental health issues and progressive neurological disorders such as dementia. This is useful, not only for Police Scotland, but also for local authority partners and third sector agencies, to inform internal protocols and procedures.

48. Most people (including children) go missing from their home address. The number of people missing from home has decreased in the past year, as well as reductions in those missing from NHS settings, foster care and children’s houses. This is shown in figure 4.

*("Other" in figure 4 includes people missing at sea or work address)

Figure 4 – Number of missing persons by location

49. Police Scotland systems have the ability to analyse and report on valuable trend information, which has identified the following:

• almost 85% of missing person investigations are resolved within 24 hours
• most missing person investigations involve males
• investigations with a dementia/neurological disorder marker on the system have fallen by 13% compared with 2021/22
• missing person investigations with a mental health marker made up over 31% of all investigations in 2023/24.

50. Identifying and understanding these issues and trends provides an opportunity for the development of targeted prevention and intervention measures, in partnership with other organisations, to reduce the number of missing person episodes. We say more about the police and partner response in respect of preventive approaches later in this report.

51. Police Scotland has demonstrated consistent success in resolving missing person incidents over recent years. Performance data for the past four years up to 2022/23, demonstrates that over 99% of missing people are traced alive each year. In addition, 94% of missing incidents are closed within 48 hours, with 58% closed within the first eight hours.

52. While people who have been missing may return of their own volition, the UK missing persons unit missing persons data report 2021/22 highlights that Police Scotland locates 60% of missing people in Scotland. This is double the average rate of individuals located by police in England and Wales (at just over 30%). Reasons for the disparity between results in Scotland compared with England and Wales are unclear, as the report provided by the UKMPU does not provide any contextual explanation. Therefore, it cannot be ascertained if the differences relate to reporting practices or investigative processes and protocols.