FOI 0082-2025/26 Rape and Sexual Offences

Request
Please share the following information for each police station in your force.

Please may I have information for over the past 5 years, from 1 January 2020.

Q1. How many reports of rape and sexual offences were there with an identified suspect? 

Q2. Of the reports of rape and sexual offences with an identified suspect, please share the outcome of each case. For example, no further action, referred to the CPS.

Q3. Of the reports of rape and sexual offences with an identified suspect (identified in Q1), how many identified suspects were interviewed? Please share the number of cases rather than the number of identified suspects interviewed. 

Q4. Of the reports of rape and sexual offences with an identified suspect (identified in Q1), how many victims were interviewed? Please share the number of cases rather than the number of victims interviewed. 

Extent of Searches to Locate Information
Following receipt of your request searches were conducted within North Yorkshire Police to locate relevant information. 

Decision
I am not obliged to provide you with a response to your request pursuant to Section 12(1) of the Freedom of Information Act 2000 (the Act). Please note that when one part of your request falls under Section 12, we are not obliged to review the rest of the questions and the whole request is therefore exempt.

Section 12(1) applies to your request as the cost of complying with your request is above the amount to which we are legally required to respond i.e. the cost of identifying and retrieving any relevant information exceeds the ‘appropriate level’ as stated in the Freedom of Information (Appropriate Limit and Fees) Regulations 2004.

Due to the nature of our recording systems the information requested, if held, is not in an easily retrievable format. Our information retrieval process generally relies on a computer ran report which captures any information recorded upon the surface of a record or within specified fields. Where relevant information is held deeper in the record, or outside of a specified field, a manual assessment is required to retrieve that information.

In order to retrieve the requested information, it would be necessary to manually review all reports of rape and sexual assault received in the timeframe specified, of which there are over 8700, to determine the number where the suspect and/or victim were interviewed. It is estimated that this exercise will take approximately 5 minutes per record, and a total of 725 hours, thereby exceeding the time limit under the FOI Act by a considerable margin.

Pursuant to Section 17(5) of the Freedom of Information Act this letter acts as a Refusal Notice.

Pursuant to Section 16 of the Act I am required to offer you advice and assistance with regarding to refining your request to within the ‘appropriate limit’ (time/cost limit). I may be able to provide you with a response to Q1 and Q2, if you wish to revise and resubmit your request, omitting Question 3 and Q4.  If you wish to discuss this please do not hesitate to contact me.

Please note that systems used for recording information are not generic, nor are the procedures used locally in capturing the data.  It should be noted therefore that this force’s response to your questions should not be used for comparison purposes with any other responses you may receive.