Disclosures using Sarah's Law and Clare's Law (FOI)

Request

I would like more information on how often the schemes known as Sarah's Law and Clare's Law have been used.

For each scheme, can you tell us how many times requests have been made by members of the public, and how many of those requests resulted in a disclosure.

Can you provide the information in table form broken down into annual results for each year since the schemes have been in operation?

Are the schemes deemed a success?

Can you provide any general examples indicating the type of circumstances where the schemes have been successful?

Response

There is no searchable record to indicate the number of times members of the public have requested information, however our records indicate that only one disclosure was made following a request from a member of the public. The remaining disclosures have been made proactively by the States of Jersey Police.

Annual statistics are detailed in the following table.

Understandably, members of the public do not tend to make the first approach to the police. However, whenever the police receive relevant information, consideration will be given to make a pro-active approach to members of the family where there is a strong justification to do so. While the number of disclosures has been fairly low, every single disclosure we make potentially safeguards a vulnerable partner or child, and for this reason we deem both schemes to be successful.

An example of a disclosure under Sarah’s Law might be when indecent images of children are found on a computer belonging to a step-father of young children.

An example of a disclosure under Clare’s Law might be when a new partner would be unaware of an earlier term of imprisonment for a serious assault on a previous partner.