Pirc

A new report has made 81 recommendations for improving police complaints handling, investigations and misconduct issues, having identified many poor practices. The report, produced following an independent review jointly commissioned in June 2018 and undertaken by Dame Elish Angiolini QC, assessed t

An independent investigation report has found that police were justified in discharging PAVA spray during the arrest of a woman acting violently.

An independent investigation report has found Police Scotland was not to blame for the injuries sustained by a disqualified motorcyclist who collided with a tree. When officers in Aberdeen came across the 28-year-old man just after midnight on 26 June 2019, they instructed him to stop but he failed

An independent investigation has recommended that Police Scotland undertakes a review of the guidance given to officers regarding monitoring people being transported in police vehicles. The recommendation comes after a 25-year-old woman suffered severe burns when she set fire to her clothing in the

An independent investigation has found that police were justified in using a Taser device on a 20-year-old man who they feared may harm himself. Officers went to a house in Bannockburn at around midnight on Saturday 30 March 2019, following reports that a man was in possession of a knife. Based on t

Michelle Macleod has been appointed as the new Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (PIRC). Mrs Macleod, who is currently Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector for the Inspectorate of Prosecution in Scotland, will take up her new role on 17 August 2019.

The Police Investigations & Review Commissioner (PIRC) has found that police were justified in using a baton on a man with a history of violence who threatened to stab one of the officers pursuing him. Officers arrived in the Rutherglen area of Glasgow on the afternoon of 21 January 2019 after p

The Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (PIRC) has published its findings on two incidents involving the use of PAVA irritant spray. In one case concerning the use of the spray on a 39-year-old man during a violent struggle in a police cell, the watchdog said the use was both necessary and

It was "not reasonable or necessary" for a police officer to discharge a Taser on a 28-year-old man in Bannockburn last year, the Police Investigation and Review Commissioner (PIRC) has found. The watchdog has published its report on an incident which took place outside a pub in Quakerfield, Bannock

Police Scotland must ensure that all police officers receive appropriate training and guidance in assessing missing person reports, the Police Investigations & Review Commissioner (PIRC) has said. The watchdog has published a report which concludes that there was a delay in police going to the f

The Police Investigations & Review Commissioner (PIRC) has proposed legislative amendments to strengthen the organisation’s ability to carry out its key functions: to investigate serious incidents involving the police and to review how the police handle complaints made about them. In its s

A police watchdog has recommended that Police Scotland ensures all officers undertaking or commanding firearms operations are reminded of the legal basis for their powers, and of the need to explain and justify using such powers on an emergency basis following an incident with a man wielding a

A report by the Police Investigations & Review Commissioner (PIRC) has found that police should have been sent sooner to the home of a woman listed as a vulnerable person after a call from a concerned family member about her welfare was categorised as a priority in an incident last May. The body

A Police Investigations & Review Commissioner (PIRC) report has found that police were justified in their use of a baton launcher and a Taser device when they were arresting an armed man. Officers from Police Scotland were called to the incident on the morning of Saturday 2 June 2018 in Troon, w

The Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (PIRC) has found that in three police incidents the use of Tasers by specially trained officers (STOs) was both necessary and proportionate. Five hundred STOs have been trained by Police Scotland in the use of Taser devices and were deployed from Jun