Six years ago, a room in Jamaica no bigger than a large store cupboard was filled from floor to ceiling with pieces of paper.
At first glance, those not used to working in a digital environment could’ve mistakenly assumed the stacks were just simply piles of scrap paper waiting to be recycled.
However, these sheets of paper were actually the criminal records of Jamaican nationals, including some of the country’s most dangerous criminals who had committed murder, rape, and other serious offenses.
Dating back to 1969, there were an estimated 300,000 paper files in this room. Just imagine how tedious and time-consuming it was for officers in the Jamaican Constabulary Force (JCF) to sift through all these pieces of paper every time they needed to locate a criminal record.
Wanting to modernize their way of working, the JCF approached ACRO to discuss their need for a computerized criminal records database.
ACRO is a world leader in its field and has the skills and knowledge to build networks to manage the risk of crime. As such, the office was delighted to be asked to work with its Jamaican colleagues to achieve a more cohesive approach to criminal records storage and management.
Building new partnerships is key to meeting shared aims and to achieving greater international security and safer communities across the world. As ACRO already has processes in place backed by thorough legislation, it seemed entirely logical that this collaboration would be mutually beneficial.
Thus, in 2013, Jamaica signed an information sharing agreement with ACRO, which resulted in funding approval from the Conflict, Stability and Security Fund (CSSF). The CSSF supports work to reduce risk in countries where the United Kingdom (UK) has key interests. The funding allowed four members of the JCF to undergo training in the UK on the new system.
The information sharing agreement creates a process for requesting criminal records information when a person is subject to criminal proceedings or for public protection. This agreement also ensures that notifications of criminal convictions are routinely shared between Jamaica and the UK when they relate to each other’s nationals.
The data management system (DMS) went live in June 2016 and paid dividends for Jamaica, with the criminal record response times immediately dropping. The average time taken following a request for criminal conviction information is currently an impressive eight days (with a record response of six hours). To put this into perspective, prior to the implementation of the DMS, it took in excess of 140 working days to receive a criminal records response, which was no doubt due to the lengthy process that involved Jamaican officers trawling through the paper mountain in an attempt to pinpoint the correct record.
Thankfully, the mountain is now steadily shrinking as paper records are being uploaded into the DMS.
Once an offender has been identified, it is essential that the correct biometrics are linked to the correct subject. To ensure the subject’s details and convictions are linked to the right person, the Automated Fingerprint Identification System (AFIS) is used to confirm this connection. ACRO has assisted the JCF with digitally linking a subject’s fingerprint records with their criminal database to allow for this important function.
The benefits of digitalization not only include speeding up exchange times but also allow countries to develop mechanisms like sex offender registries and improve transnational criminal targeting. This is a key element of ACRO’s development work within the Eastern Caribbean.
Jamaica has the second highest number of non-EU criminals behind bars in the UK and has been designated by the Home Office as a priority country. They now have a fast and efficient digitalized system that contributes to ACRO’s aim of safer communities in the UK and across the world. This collaborative approach undertaken with ACRO’s Jamaican counterparts benefits both parties.
In order to maintain and enhance this key bilateral relationship, ACRO is in constant communication with Jamaica. ACRO Superintendent James Fulton travelled to Kingston, Jamaica, in February 2019 to sign off on the four-year £2 million project for the full digitalization and workflow improvement processes on the island.
He met with Jamaican Police Commissioner Major General Antony Anderson and Deputy Commissioner and Inspector General Selvin Hay of the Jamaica Constabulary Force, who affirm that the digitalization has clearly improved their processes and sped up and increased the accuracy of responses.
Global Collaborations
ACRO is proud of the working partnership that it has established with Jamaica, and the UK is always looking to form mutually beneficial alliances with other countries. As such, an information sharing agreement was formalized with the Bermuda Police Service (BPS) in 2014, similar to the one signed with Jamaica.
Again funded by CSSF, a member of ACRO staff was seconded to Bermuda for a 12-week attachment to support the BPS conversion of paper criminal record files onto an electronic management system known as MEMEX.
It was estimated that 20,000 records were migrated to the new system, following an initial launch in 2016 that prioritized the records of violent, sexual, gang, and prolific offenders.
This allowed ACRO to identify Bermudans with a British passport who have a history of committing serious offenses. As a result, the UK Police National Computer (PNC) records can be updated, and this information can be made widely available to UK forces should those people ever travel to the UK. For the foreseeable future, ACRO will continue to identify subjects on MEMEX who hold British passports and update their criminal conviction records on the PNC.
Building and maintaining these key relationships are crucial, and in February, ACRO hosted future Deputy Commissioner (designee) of Police in Bermuda Darrin Simons. Deputy Commissioner Simons was in the UK undertaking a senior command course at the College of Policing and visited ACRO during his time in the UK.
Deputy Commissioner Simons spoke highly of ACRO as a professional organization and its commitment to safeguarding and creating a safer environment for all.
To support law enforcement agencies on other Caribbean islands, ACRO works with the Association of Caribbean Chiefs of Police (ACCP) and plays an important role within the association.
Through this relationship, five information sharing agreements have been established in the region. Along with Jamaica, ACRO has agreements in place with Antigua, Barbados, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and Trinidad and Tobago.
As well as dealing directly with Jamaica and Bermuda, ACRO has negotiated access to the Overseas Territories Regional Crime Intelligence System (OTRCIS) to assist in streamlining criminal records. This is an important tool that supports ACRO’s safeguarding mission as it gives the organization access to the conviction data of offenders from Anguilla, Bermuda, Cayman Islands, Montserrat, and Turks and Caicos.
Although representing only a small number of the total criminal conviction exchange requests ACRO receives, these nationals’ records are important as these islanders are considered to be British nationals and as such have a right to obtain a full UK passport, in addition to a British Overseas Territory passport. As holders of full UK passports, they have free movement in and out of the UK.
A delegation of ACRO staff also flew to Barbados and Saint Lucia last year to research what measures could be taken to improve the exchange of criminal conviction information between the UK and these islands.
The visit was to gain insight into whether they would be suitable candidates for a similar IT solution that operates in Jamaica and Bermuda. Part of the focus of the visit was to see first-hand how the Royal Barbados Police Force (RBPF) manages criminal records. They have an electronic database that was set up a few years ago but also still use handwritten records.
The INTERPOL office in Barbados had noticed that replies from Jamaica had been coming back more quickly than ever before, which shows that other countries, not just the UK, are also seeing the benefits of the electronic criminal conviction exchange systems established in Jamaica and Bermuda.
ACRO-FBI Partnership
It is not just the Caribbean that has been identified as a priority region for ACRO, and the organization has been working hard to form information sharing agreements with countries such as the United States, India, and Albania.
ACRO has a specialist development team that researches and assesses countries across the world to identify where risks to the UK exist, either from foreign nationals committing crimes in the UK or UK nationals committing crimes overseas.
To that end, following almost 10 years of diligent work between the UK and the United states, an information sharing agreement was signed in March 2017.
The memorandum of understanding (MOU) is between the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division (CJIS) and ACRO. It has created a standard for the exchange of criminal histories and offenders’ biometric information between both law enforcement agencies.
Like ACRO, CJIS is a law enforcement organization that has a role in coordinating and managing the timely exchange of criminal records information to help keep communities safe.
Both organizations are well placed to share information since CJIS serves as the central repository of criminal records and fingerprints processed by thousands of federal, state, local, and tribal police organizations in the United States, similar to ACRO’s role in the UK.
The agreement benefits both countries and strengthens the law enforcement relationship between the UK and the United States.
Under the terms of the agreement, ACRO sends the FBI details of U.S. nationals convicted in the UK and vice versa, and both countries respond to requests about either countries’ nationals who have criminal records in the United States or the UK.
The MOU has established and solidified a streamlined and much more effective and standardized process on exchanging conviction information. As a result, the UK has a much stronger working relationship with the United States and this has resulted in increased responses to requests for conviction information.
The agreement was signed in March 2017, and exchanges began in September of the same year. The number has jumped from just 7 in the years preceding the MOU to 128 between September 2017 and August 2018.
The next steps for ACRO include sending the U.S. historical conviction data held in the UK about U.S. nationals and analyzing similar historical data received from CJIS about UK nationals convicted in the United States.
Connecting the Dots
There are policing units like ACRO and CJIS throughout the world, and sometimes it’s a question of connecting the dots between them.
On a wider scale, global connections have been established between the UK and the United States along with Canada, Australia, and New Zealand since the 1950s when the countries came together to form the Five Eyes, which is widely regarded as the world’s most significant intelligence alliance.
ACRO seeks ongoing cooperation with the UK’s Five Eyes partners in order to expand the sharing of criminal conviction information and to develop the most effective exchange mechanisms for the benefit of all. It’s these mechanisms that will together help policing worldwide tackle serious and organized crime, reduce risk and harm, and safeguard vulnerable people.
Experience shows that building new partnerships is key to meeting shared aims. ACRO has the expertise and knowledge to form alliances with law enforcement colleagues worldwide and will continue its work toward managing the risk of crime—ultimately creating safer communities across the world.
Please cite as
Rob Price, “Crime Is a Global Business: ACRO Criminal Records Office’s Collaborative Efforts Worldwide,” Police Chief Online, August 26, 2020.
