Imagine you’re a police officer in Denmark and you’ve just gotten wind of a suspect who’s conning retirees out of their savings. You’re itching to investigate – until your supervisor tells you you’re not allowed to look the case up in the police IT systems.
Why not? Because it might turn out the suspect has swindled other Danes in other police districts. And then all those cases would land on your desk, too. Better, then, to shelve the case and close it while it’s still small.
This isn’t a hypothetical. It’s a lived reality for several Danish investigators. It is one of countless distress calls from officers that the National Audit Office published Monday in two reports that paint a picture of a Danish police force in deep crisis.
The example also infuriates the chairman of the Danish Police Union, Heino Kegel, when Politiken reads it aloud to him.
»That reality shouldn’t be dismissed – when officers say it, it’s because that’s what their leadership has told them. It makes me lose my mind. It’s the wrong instruction. So why do it?« Kegel asks, then answers himself:
»Probably because they’re not good enough at leading their way out of the police and managing expectations with citizens and politicians. We can’t keep meeting your expectations with the resources we have available«.
Who is right?
Reality itself is what’s being fought over in the so-called “police washing” scandal, which Parliament’s state auditors have described as the biggest in many years. They accuse the Danish police of mishandling assault and rape cases, while victims of digital fraud are left without legal recourse – or lied to outright. On that basis, the Danish People’s Party believes the national police commissioner, Thorkild Fogde, should step down.
The national police commissioner, however, has more than hinted that the National Audit Office has choked on several of the numbers. The same view is shared by several other police leaders Politiken has spoken with. They insist the police investigate most cases, even though the National Audit Office and a number of their own officers seemingly believe otherwise.
The starkest picture of “reality” came from state auditor Monika Rubin (M), who said outright that »she would rather be raped in Copenhagen than on Funen«. In her view, that would give you a markedly better chance of having the case solved. A claim Funen Police flatly reject, saying the state auditors have not dug into the cases.
»When you read the report, you have to pay attention to what they’re examining«, said Lisa Vibe-Pedersen, acting police director for Funen Police.
»They’re examining how rape cases are opened. They find that we have a fairly large number of cases opened under so-called investigation numbers. But in this area, they haven’t gone in and looked at how the cases were then investigated. We have, and we’ve seen ourselves that we handled the cases correctly. The relevant investigative steps were taken«, the police director continued.
On Tuesday, Politiken asked the state auditors what they make of Funen Police’s rejection of the criticism. The chair of the state auditors, Mette Abildgaard (Conservative), replied that she has full confidence in the National Audit Office’s conclusions.
»The reports show a widespread practice in which many cases are closed without proper investigation, in several instances following instructions from police leadership. Whatever the intention may have been in the specific case, it underscores the need for communication to officers to be clear and unambiguous. We have noted that, in several areas, the police disagree with the National Audit Office, and we look forward to receiving a response to the reports from an incoming minister of justice«, she said.
Which numbers apply?
Heino Kegel of the Police Union does not believe any of the parties are lying. Instead, he believes at least three versions of reality have collided in the “police washing” scandal.
»We have the public’s reality, which experiences this failure. Then we have the officers’ reality – they’re frustrated that cases are sitting around gathering dust. But the Danish Police and leadership also have their reality, where they have to meet certain political constraints and demands. Instead of pushing back clearly against politicians, they’ve said: »We’ll find a solution«. Even though they don’t have the resources. And now it’s backfiring«.
According to Politiken’s information, political concern has emerged over whether police leadership is sugarcoating reality for politicians. That cannot be ruled out, Heino Kegel said.
Has police leadership sugarcoated reality for politicians?
»You might have a point. But you’d probably have to talk to the Danish Police and leadership about that«.
What is certain is that the National Audit Office is speaking from the top of an enormous pile of material. It has reviewed more than 37 million text fields in the police IT systems, processed 10,000 guidelines and instructions, and conducted spot checks of specific cases. Finally, it sent questionnaires to 10,653 police employees, of whom 4,117 responded.
But the reports also show that, along the way, the Danisg Police tried to cast doubt on the National Audit Office’s method. For example, the police argue that you cannot conduct an analysis based solely on the 37 million text fields containing case information about reports and closed cases. You have to review every single case before you can draw conclusions with confidence:
»It is therefore the view of the National Police and the Director of Public Prosecutions that an examination of the police’s case-closure practice should be based solely on a review of each and every case underlying the analytical results, including any physical files that have not been recorded in POLSAS«, the National Audit Office writes of the dispute.
That would, however, require a manual review of tens of thousands of cases. The National Audit Office does not believe it is necessary, since it is looking for »overall patterns in the police’s case handling«. The National Audit Office also notes that »both the Danish Police and the Director of Public Prosecutions themselves use the registrations for, among other things, crime statistics, resource management, and answering parliamentary questions«.
If the numbers can’t be used, then – as the National Audit Office would have it – they can’t be used when the police answer politicians’ questions, either.
Police chiefs reject criticism
On that very point, the National Audit Office raises doubts about how the police present reality. A recurring criticism is that many reports are opened as so-called “investigation cases,” rather than as formal cases. As a result, they do not appear in police statistics, the National Audit Office writes:
»The consequence is that data from the police, including briefings to Parliament, underestimate the scope of financial crime«, the National Audit Office writes.
According to one of the reports, around 2,000 rape cases have also been opened as so-called investigation cases and therefore do not appear in responses to Parliament.
But the police have no interest in hiding the scale of crime from politicians. That is what Henriette Rosenborg Larsen, police director in Southeast Jutland Police, said. She pointed to the fact that each police district is allocated funding each year based on a special distribution formula, the so-called RAM model.
»And among the factors in that distribution is the number of Penal Code reports, so it would be pretty unwise, as a police director, to forgo resources because you ordered people to open investigation cases. There’s nothing to it«, she said.
State auditor Mette Abildgaard (Conservative) maintains that, regardless of the explanation, it is the wrong practice:
»When it’s problematic that cases are opened as investigation cases, it’s because there are fewer requirements for investigation, they risk sitting for a long time, and the cases don’t count in the overall statistics on unsolved cases. That applies regardless of what the intention may have been on the police’s side«.
