Counterfeit Football Shirt Seizures 2019-present

Request

1. The total number of counterfeit football shirts seized by your force each year from 2019 to themost recent year available.

2. (If readily available) The estimated total value (£) of these seized shirts for each year.

3. The number of arrests each year relating to the sale or distribution of counterfeit football shirts,or counterfeit football merchandise, if shirts are not recorded separately.

For consistency:

- Please provide figures for full calendar years (Jan–Dec) where possible. If only financial year datais available, please specify this.

- If your systems do not separately record “football shirts,” please confirm this and provide data forthe broader category of counterfeit sportswear instead.

- Please confirm whether seizure counts represent individual shirts or seizure incidents/operations,and whether value estimates are based on retail or street value.

Response

I sourced your request to various departments across the force and have supplied information below.

Question 1

No Information Held – we do not record as standard if a football shirt/sportswear is believed to be counterfeit or not and therefore do not hold any data relevant to this request.

Question 2

No Information Held

Question 3

I approached our Performance Review Unit for assistance with Q3 of your request. An analyst within this unit has conducted a search of our Crime Management System - Connect which records complaints or allegations of those matters, which the Home Office specify should be recorded as 'crimes'. All our systems are designed and used first and foremost for Policing Purposes and have limited search capability. They provided me with the below data in response and the following explanation regarding their search criteria:

We don’t have a reason for arrest that is specifically counterfeit football shirts/merchandise related.  Consequently, this requires the Circumstance of Arrest (CoA) to be reviewed on records that match the following criteria:

• Arrest Date between 01/01/2019 and 31/07/2025.
• Circumstance of Arrest contains one or more of the following keywords:
• COUNTERFEIT FOOT
• COUNTERFEIT SPORT
• COUNTERFEIT MERCH
• FAKE FOOT
• FAKE SPORT
• FAKE MERCH

Answer: Less than 10 arrests since 2019

Please note we cannot provide a further breakdown as it would trigger an exemption.