POLICE in North Yorkshire conducted 1,000 more stop and searches in 2020 than the previous year, despite the Covid lockdowns.

Home Office data shows the force used stop and search powers 3,797 times in the year to March – up from 2,536 the year before.

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Despite this rise, the proportion of searches which led to an arrest fell from 13 per cent to 12 per cent over this period.

StopWatch UK said the vast majority of searches cause more problems than they solve.

Habib Kadiri, research and policy manager at the police monitoring organisation, said a fall in arrest rates reflects fears that police-community relations are deteriorating.

The figures also show that across England and Wales, black people were significantly more likely to be searched than white people, though slightly less so than the year before.

In North Yorkshire, they were six times more likely to be stopped, compared to 9.7 in 2019/20.

Mr Kadiri added: "What is exceptional is how racial disparities persisted even during a global pandemic, proving that the police never stopped working tirelessly to over-police people of colour.

“We simply would not accept this of any other emergency service profession."

In North Yorkshire, 69 per cent of stop and searches were drugs-related – up from 62 per cent and a record high.

A spokesman for North Yorkshire Police said that during lockdown periods in 2020/2021 there was a reduced demand on resources, allowing officers to conduct more proactive patrols.

He said: "The government enforced temporary legislation in order to minimise the spread of Covid19 which gave police officers powers in relation to such things as non-essential travel.

"In order to enforce this legislation officers engaged with the public using the four E’s – engage, explain, encourage, enforce.

“During the course of these interactions there may have been instances where officers formed reasonable grounds to suspect that the person they were speaking to was in possession of illegal drugs, stolen property, a weapon or an article intended to be used in the commission of a crime."

He said were these grounds were suspected, officers will use their powers under the Police and Criminal Evidence Act to conduct a search of that person.

 

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