Project to monitor the use of force by the police

On occasion, police officers have to resort to forcible means when maintaining public order. Every occasion in which forcible means are used is registered in the Emergency Response Centre Data System. The recorded entry does not, however, specify the type of situations in which the police have to resort to the use of force. A new system for data collection, developed for monitoring the situations in which forcible means are used, provides detailed information about these situations, their reasons and consequences.

The National Police Board has assigned the Police University College the task of collecting information about the use of force by the police and any damage done with forcible means not related to the actual situations in which force was used. Monitoring has taken place on a daily basis since January 2016. Information is collected specifically for each police department, and at the national scale. The material collected will form an internationally comparable database, unique in the Nordic countries.

Timescale: standard follow-up

Funding: budget funding

Contact persons at the Police University College: [email protected]