Government of Jersey

Strip searches undertaken by Police and Custom Services (FOI)

Produced by the Freedom of Information office
Authored by Government of Jersey and published on 10 May 2022.
Prepared internally, no external costs.

Request

Please could you provide the figures for the number of strip searches undertaken by the Police and Customs Services since 2015, broken down by year, service and sex.

Also, please provide figures for the number of people under the age of 18 who have been strip searched since 2015 by the Police and Customs Services.

Response

The power for police officers to strip search an individual is provided by the Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Codes of Practice) (Jersey) Order 2004 (PPACE).

Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Codes of Practice) (Jersey) Order 2004 (jerseylaw.je)

The powers are extended to customs officers by the Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Application To Customs and Excise) (Jersey) Order 2004.

Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Application To Customs and Excise) (Jersey) Order 2004 (jerseylaw.je)

Code A of PPACE governs the powers of officers to stop and search an individual. Searches involving the exposure of intimate parts of the body define a "strip search". Such searches may only be carried out at a "nearby police station or other nearby location which is out of public view" (please refer to Paragraph 4.7 of PPACE).

Code C – Annex A of PPACE governs the powers to authorise the strip search of an individual while held in custody. "A strip search may take place only if the custody officer considers it to be necessary to remove an article which the detained person would not be allowed to keep, and the officer reasonably considers that the person might have concealed such an article. Strip searches shall not be routinely carried out where there is no reason to consider that articles have been concealed."

Strip Searches Conducted by Officers of the States of Jersey Police (SoJP)
	While detained in custody¹				During a Stop and Search²
	Total males	Total females	Total males and females	Of which were under 18 years	Total males	Total females	Total males and females	Of which were under 18 years
2015	52	13	65	1	6	0	6	0
2016	54	9	63	3	6	1	7	0
2017	42	8	50	1	2	0	2	0
2018	45	4	49	5	9	0	9	1
2019	31	1	32	4	2	1	3	1
2020	16	1	17	3	4	1	5	1
2021	12	2	14	2	5	0	5	1
2022³	7	0	7	3	0	0	0	0

¹ The search term "strip search" was used to interrogate SoJP's custody database.

² The search term "strip search" was used to interrogate SoJP's "Stopcheck" database.

³ Figures accurate up to 30th March.

The table below includes all strip searches conducted (excluding those in custody) by Jersey Customs and Immigration Service under Article 53 of the Customs and Excise (Jersey) Law 1999 and Article 29 of the Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Jersey) Law 2003.

Customs and Excise (Jersey) Law 1999 (jerseylaw.je)

Police Procedures and Criminal Evidence (Jersey) Law 2003 (jerseylaw.je).

Year	Number of strip searches	Male	Female	Under 18
2015	80	71	9	1
2016	81	72	9	0
2017	84	69	15	0
2018	37	32	4	0
2019	23	19	4	0
2020	18	15	3
2021	5	3	2

Jersey Customs and Immigration Service manually record details of strip searches conducted on persons in custody. To extract the information requested would exceed the cost limit provisions allowed under Article 16 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 and the 12.5 hours limit allowed under regulation 2 (1) of the Freedom of Information (Costs) (Jersey) Regulations 2014.

Articles Applied

Article 16 – A scheduled public authority may refuse to supply information if cost excessive

A scheduled public authority that has been requested to supply information may refuse to supply the information if it estimates that the cost of doing so would exceed an amount determined in the manner prescribed by Regulations