Policing

The PSNI has apologised after an unprecedented data breach saw the names, roles and other personal details of all serving police officers and civilian staff published on its website. The details were inadvertently disclosed as part of the PSNI's response to a freedom of information request about sta

Northern Ireland’s High Court has determined that a decision of the Chief Constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland to refuse an application for retirement was unlawful. The court rejected the claim that this refusal was done in the public interest, due to the fact that the officer i

Proposed new garda powers to track vehicles using automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) technology should be subject to judicial oversight, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) and Digital Rights Ireland have said. The NGOs have sent legislators a list of proposed amendments to the An Ga

Legislation underpinning PSNI powers to strip-search people in custody should be "re-written" to require officers to reasonably suspect that the detained person has concealed a prohibited item, the Northern Ireland Policing Board has said. The oversight body yesterday published a human rights review

A standalone bill allowing for the use of facial recognition technology (FRT) by An Garda Síochána will be brought forward later in the year, the government has announced. The Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) Bill 2022, which is currently before the Dáil and will

Lawyers for a 27-year-old dental nurse arrested at her workplace in Derry yesterday have said they will bring proceedings against the PSNI for a "distasteful and deplorable abuse of powers". In a statement issued yesterday afternoon, the PSNI said the woman was arrested on suspicion of being concern

Legislation allowing for the general and indiscriminate retention of communications traffic and location data on national security grounds, subject to judicial approval, is to come into force. Having returned from maternity leave, justice minister Helen McEntee yesterday signed a commencement order

An Garda Síochána has been designated as the competent authority in Ireland for issuing legal orders requiring internet service providers to remove online terrorist content. Under the EU Terrorist Content Online Regulation, each EU member state is obliged to designate a competent autho

Mountjoy Prison governor Eddie Mullins has been appointed as chair of the Dublin North Inner City local community safety partnership (LCSP). Under the Department of Justice’s community safety policy, LCSPs will replace and build upon the existing joint policing committees. There are currently

Sir Iain Livingstone, Police Scotland's chief constable, has admitted that the single force is institutionally racist and discriminatory. The revelation follows a review that revealed instances of racism, sexism, and homophobia by active officers. Reports of staff facing repercussions for flagging t

Amnesty International has raised concerns about the disproportionate use of stop and search by the PSNI on people from minoritised ethnic communities and on children. In total, 23,650 people were stopped and searched in Northern Ireland by police in the year to the end of March 2023, according to ne

Retired Northern Ireland civil servant Anthony Harbinson has been appointed to the Policing Authority. Mr Harbinson retired last year as permanent secretary of Northern Ireland's Department of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs.

The Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland has said there was "collusive behaviour" in the original police investigation into the 1974 abduction and murder of Omagh councillor Patrick 'Patsy' Kelly. In a report published yesterday, Marie Anderson said Mr Kelly's family was "failed by police" as the r

Two PSNI officers are to be prosecuted for a range of offences in connection with "numerous incidents" including the alleged sharing of imagery taken at the scenes of sudden deaths. The Public Prosecution Service (PPS) said yesterday that it had taken the decision to prosecute following the consider

The Supreme Court has held that the seizure of computer devices from an accused murderer’s home was unlawful in circumstances where gardaí failed to seek authority from the District Court when applying for a search warrant. While the gardaí always intended to search the digital c