Policing is to cost more in North Yorkshire, but what will people get for their money? In the first part of an investigation STEPHEN LEWIS spotlights the intelligence squad

SOME time early last year a crime analyst, tucked away in a small room at York police station sifting through details of calls from the public, spotted what looked like a worrying pattern. Reports had come in of a man driving slowly around a York estate. Children had also been reporting a man in a slow-moving car staring at them as he passed.

It could have been nothing. "If it is one or two incidents at different locations on different dates, you think are we over-reacting to something?" says Detective Insp Phil Roberts of York police. "Is it just someone looking for a particular house, who has got lost?"

This time the analyst noticed two things. The description of the car in each report was similar, and it was being seen at the same time each day, as children were coming out of school.

It was enough for DI Roberts and his team at York police's crime intelligence unit to take it seriously.

Beat officers were alerted, and asked to look out for any car answering the description of the one in the area at the times reported.

At the same time, using the police national computer, intelligence officers drew up a list of all cars matching the description and colour given that were registered in York.

It was a long list but the team began checking it against cars owned by registered sex offenders. Then beat officers stopped a car matching the description. "The driver was identified as having been of interest to the police in the past involving previous interests in children," says DI Roberts.

It was enough to justify a surveillance. The man was followed to a children's playground where his behaviour was observed. "After which," says DI Roberts crisply, "he was arrested. We believe the police action may have prevented a serious offence on a child."

It is a classic example of the way in which intelligence-led policing works - of how the flow of information from members of the public and other sources can be analysed to yield vital clues which help police react quickly or even prevent a crime. And it's why, in some of the more expensive budget 'options' put forward by North Yorkshire chief constable Della Cannings, substantial amounts of cash - more than £1 million, to be spent on things like IT surveillance - would be invested in intelligence-led policing next year.

With budgets tight, many in the force see this as the most efficient way of using limited resources. Uniformed officers on the streets are all very well, says DI Roberts: "But if you have a policeman in uniform on a high-visibility patrol, the villain will see the policeman before the policeman sees the villain."

So the alternative is to 'police clever'. The handful of analysts in the York crime intelligence unit sift through the flood of information that pours in every day - tip-offs from the public, leads from informants, crime reports, forensic analyses - looking for patterns and trends. As well as helping police track down individual offenders, they help senior officers decide how resources in general should be best deployed.

Under a national intelligence model used by every force in the country, there are daily, fortnightly and quarterly 'intelligence' meetings to decide priorities, using information provided by analysts.

Crime statistics show certain crimes are more likely to be committed at certain times of year. Burglaries, for example, shoot up when the clocks change in autumn and the evenings draw in. Because they can predict that, police can target resources accordingly.

By analysing details of recent crimes, the intelligence unit can also identify shorter-term crime trends - crime hot-spots, for example, which have seen a rash of recent burglaries; or crime series, where there appear to be links between crimes not in the same area such as a series of pubs being broken into across the city.

From April when - along with the rest of the North Yorkshire force - the intelligence unit will be restructured to make it more effective, DI Roberts hopes to have a new police 'intranet' system almost ready to bring on line.

It is an example of the kind of new investment needed and will mean patterns and trends identified by crime analysts can be used to brief frontline police officers anywhere in the city daily on what they need to be looking out for while on patrol.

The key to intelligence led policing, however, is in getting 'good' information in the first place - which is where the public come in.

Often, a seemingly-innocuous piece of information - such as a man in a red baseball cap spotted standing under a lamp-post late at night - can lead to a breakthrough.

"He may not be a burglar," says DI Roberts. "But if he's standing there at that time is he a lookout? You very rarely see anybody climbing out of a window with a telly. But what you may see is someone hanging about in the street or where they should not be. So report it! It may just be the one little piece the analyst needs."

By the nature of his 'work', a burglar can be difficult to apprehend. "A burglar who goes out in the middle of the night, tip-toeing around looking for open windows can be quite difficult to catch," admits DI Roberts. "You try and follow someone in the middle of the night on foot without being seen!"

So intelligence is the key. The crime analyst going through reports of burglaries might spot a series of repeat burglaries in a certain street, or notice there have been several burglaries using the same MO.

He or she will then start looking for reports of suspicious activity in that area. Somebody may have heard something at 2am - and looking out, seen the man in the red baseball cap. "And it may be that two days later a patrol officer sees 'Johnny Smith', a bit of a local toe-rag, walking down the street wearing a red baseball cap," says DI Roberts.

He may also have been wearing a blue jumper - and the crime analyst, checking forensic reports from burgled homes, will notice blue fibres were recovered. A search of police records may then reveal 'Johnny Smith' was arrested for burglary a couple of years earlier, and the MO then was similar to that used in the latest break-ins.

Checks will be made on his known associates, and fingerprints and other forensic information input into 'the system'. His home may be put under surveillance - and eventually police will have enough information for a search warrant.

If they have done their homework properly, that may well lead to the recovery of stolen property, and the burglar will be bang to rights.

And it all may be down to the fact someone saw somebody standing outside their bedroom window late at night wearing a red baseball cap, and had the nous to report it.

Updated: 12:11 Wednesday, January 08, 2003