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IPCC Annual Report
Today the IPCC published its Annual Report and Statement of Accounts for 2007/08. The annual report includes statistics on deaths in or following police custody, fatal shootings by police officers and deaths following other types of police contact such as deaths linked to sieges and evading arrest.
The number of fatal police-related road traffic incidents has halved in the last year according to today's figures. There were 17 fatal road traffic incidents involving police in England and Wales during 2007/08 compared to 35 in 2006/07. These resulted in 23 fatalities, a fall of 13 deaths from 36 in 2006/07.
Other key findings reported are:
- There were a total of 75 deaths during or following police contact in 2007/08 (a fall of nine from 2006/07 and the lowest figure since 1 April 2004).
- Five people died as a result of being shot by police (an increase of four from 2006/07).
- Twenty one people died in or following police custody (a decrease of six from 2006/07).
- Twenty six people died during or following other police contact (an increase in six from 2006/07).
- More than eight in 10 (86%) of those people who died in or following police custody were White.
- The IPCC was involved in the investigation of almost seven out of 10 (69%) of these fatalities.
More detail can be found on the IPCC website at www.ipcc.gov.uk
We have issued the following statement to the media:
Responding to the IPCC report on deaths during or after police contact published today, Paul McKeever, Chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales, says:
"We welcome the recorded reduction in deaths following or during police contact. This is in some part due to our sustained demand for better ongoing training for all police officers and the establishment of a culture of learning from mistakes, rather a witch-hunt to apportion blame.
"Deaths during or following police contact not only cause devastation for the victims' families left behind but also greatly affect those police officers involved. It's far too simplistic to just look at the headline figures. Every statistic tells a different story, and regrettably, sometimes there are circumstances when a member of the public loses their life despite the officers involved doing everything in their power to prevent the tragedy occurring in the first instance."
