Four new projects funded by N8 PRP Small Grants.

N8 PRP are delighted to announce that four Small Grants have been funded, with research due to start in April 2022.

All four projects will investigate the policing of exploitation and abuse, and have the potential to reduce harm to some of the most vulnerable people in the UK by increasing our understanding of policing in these areas and making recommendations for better practice.

Police co-production and academic collaboration

All of the projects are in collaboration with police partners, and for the first time every police partner of N8 PRP is involved in at least one project. Many will be contributing data, interviews, and access to records, and all will take part in project Advisory Groups. These groups will discuss the ongoing development of the projects. This will allow researchers to take advantage of the wide range of expertise and experience available in the forces, and increase the opportunities for impact on police operations.

The projects will also benefit from the academic excellence of N8 universities, with 4 of the N8 involved in the projects (Durham, Leeds, Liverpool, and York). It’s also positive that despite the new funding restriction that means Small Grant funds can only be held by N8 universities, 2 projects include co-investigators from other regional universities (UCLAN and Northumbria). This points to the continued regional partnerships that N8 PRP hopes to develop in the coming year.

The projects

Understanding and preventing ‘cuckoo’ victimisation

Dr Laura Bainbridge (University of Leeds) and Professor Charlie Lloyd (University of York) will investigate ‘cuckooing’ victimisation, the practice of drug dealers taking over the home of a vulnerable person for use as a base of operations. The project will seek to interview victims and perpetrators to establish how, when and why cuckoo victims are targeted, with the aim of producing a ‘preventing cuckooing’ tactical plan for local delivery groups.

Organisational processes for data recording of Honour-Based Violence and Abuse, Forced Marriages and Female Genital Mutilation

There are significant concerns about how HBV/A, FM and FGM incidents are recorded by police, and the effect this has on victim’s ability to access justice and safety. Dr Geetanjali Gangoli (University of Durham) will lead a project investigating police understanding and recording of HBV/A, including FM and FGM in collaboration with 5 northern forces and 2 regional charities, with Dr Nikki D’Souza (Northumbria University) as Co-I. The project will produce recommendations to enable accurate and consistent reporting, which will help early identification and prevention of victimisation.

Strategies for Disrupting High risk high harm Domestic Abuse

Professor Barry Godfrey and Professor Sandra Walklate (both University of Liverpool) will analyse the trajectories of offenders on Integrated Offender Management systems to identify which strategies are successful in reducing re-offending. and consider the impact of these strategies on victim-survivor attrition. This will produce an evidence-base for good practice, helping to understand and promote successful strategies.

Who is the victim? Identifying victims and perpetrators in coercive control cases

Professor Sandra Walklate (University of Liverpool) will lead a project investigating the problem of police misidentifying the victim in coercive control cases in the context of the ‘genderless’ legal status of the crime and the manipulative behaviour of coercive offenders. Together with Dr Charlotte Barlow (UCLAN) as Co-I, the team will use data analysis and interviews with police, perpetrators and survivors to develop an evidence base that will equip police to make better-informed decisions on identifying victims and perpetrators.

If you’d like more information about the Small Grant awards or any of the projects, please get in touch with Helen Gordon-Smith, N8 PRP project manager.

Congratulations to the successful applicants!

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