21-001 - Changes to Suspicious Circumstances Incident Reports

CHANGES TO SUSPICIOUS CIRCUMSTANCES

INCIDENT REPORTS

PURPOSE

The purpose of this Field operations Directive (FOD) is to establish uniform procedures for the documentation of Suspicious Circumstances Incident reports.  Suspicious Circumstances reports should only be used when the elements of a crime cannot be established during the initial investigation; however, a deputy still believes a crime may have occurred that requires additional follow up.  These reports are usually related to, but not limited to:

• Non-criminal domestic violence;
• Court order violations;
• Cases with a delayed disclosure, such as sex crimes; or
• The victim is unable to articulate a crime occurred, such as child abuse or adult dependent abuse.

CURRENT PROCEDURES

Currently, Reporting Party (R) and Party (P) are only designated for non-criminal domestic violence reports with the parties listed in the narrative and not on the face page.  This procedure does not meet the criteria for entry into departmental databases.  This makes them difficult to locate without a Uniform Report Number (URN).  These reports could have evidentiary importance or historical information of value for future investigations.    

NEW PROCEDURES

In order to archive and locate these reports more effectively, all Suspicious Circumstances reports will now utilize participant identification codes available on the Incident Report form SH-R-49; identifying Reporting Party (R) for possible victim, and Party (P) for possible suspect. When an incident is reported by a person other than those directly involved in the incident, that person would be referred to as the Informant (I) and the participants as Parties (P).

The appropriate suspicious circumstances statistical code (i.e. possible child abuse 418, possible criminal activity 444, etc.) is to be used.  If the investigation reveals that a crime did occur, change the URN’s suspicious circumstances statistical code to the criminal statistical code which appropriately reflects the crime.  The change shall be made on a supplemental report. 

REFERENCES

Manual of Policy and Procedure (MPP) Suspicious Circumstances 4-22/060.00

Manual of Policy and Procedure (MPP) Classification or Title of Reports 4-01/020.15

Manual of Policy and Procedure (MPP) Types of Reports 4-01/020.00

Field Operations Directive (FOD) 10-05, Domestic Violence Incident Reporting Procedures