Knife Possession offences 2021 - 2024

Request
1. In the financial years, 2021/22, 22/23, 23/24 and 24/25 (Up to 10.09.24),
how many instances of knife possession offences by women has been
recorded by your force recorded? Please provide a breakdown by
financial year.
2. For the same financial years, how many of these women found to have
committed a knife possession offence were under the age of 18? Please
provide a breakdown by financial year.
3. Please detail the youngest to have committed a knife possession
offence in each financial year.

Response
I approached our Performance Review Unit for assistance with 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 following explanation regarding their search criteria:

Criteria Used - Incident Created Date is between 01/04/2021 and 10/09/2024, SYP &
crime only filter, HO Sub Sub Group Name is equal to / is in POSSESS OF ARTICLE WITH BLADE OR POINT, Person Role is equal to SUSPECT, SUSPECT
(ELIMINATED), SUSPECT (INSUFFICIENT TO PROCEED), SUSPECT
(INTERVIEWED), SUSPECT (NO ACTION) EVIDENTIAL DIFF., SUSPECT (NO
ACTION) TIME LIMIT EXPIRED, SUSPECT (NOT INTERVIEWED), SUSPECT
(PROSECUTION PREVENTED), SUSPECT PRE ATHENA, Gender is equal to / is in
Female

Q1

Q2

Q3

Please note: As shown on the table above, not all records are completed with
suspect DOB, data is provided on what is recorded at the time of incident.

2021 – 11
2022 – 11
2023 – 11
2024 – 8

Please note, every effort is made to ensure that the figures presented are accurate and complete. However, it is important to note that data has been extracted from data sources used by this force for police purposes. The detail
collected to respond specifically to your request is subject to the inaccuracies inherent in any large-scale recording systems and information assets.

The figures provided therefore are our best interpretation of relevance of data to your request, but you should be aware that the collation of figures/data for any requests may have limitations, and this should be taken into account
when those data are used.

Police forces do not use generic systems or identical procedures for capturing the data. For these reasons this response to your questions should not be used for comparison purposes with responses you may receive from other
police forces.