Has the Independent Police Complaints Commission got real muscle or is it merely a talking shop? Grania Langdon-Down gauges reaction from lawyers who have sought justice

The fatal shooting by police in London of Brazilian Jean Charles de Menezes at Stockwell Underground the day after the failed Tube bomb attacks last summer set the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC) the toughest and most high-profile test it has encountered so far in its two-year history.


Its final report into the shooting is with the Crown Prosecution Service to consider whether charges should be brought against any officer.


It is too early to judge whether the IPCC has achieved the level of robust independence intended when the commission was created by the Police Reform Act 2002. But what do lawyers working in the complex and emotive field of actions against the police feel about the system, which now has independent investigators for the most serious cases so that the police no longer investigate themselves?


So far, lawyers offer limited praise – for instance, over the commission’s determined stand when the Metropolitan Police tried to prevent it investigating the Stockwell shooting. But the Police Action Lawyers Group (PALG), which has 140 members nationally, has recently submitted a dossier raising serious concerns about the quality of some investigations.


Tony Murphy, lead partner in London firm Bindman & Partners’ police powers team, is a PALG representative on the IPCC’s advisory board. The firm represents Siôn Jenkins, who is considering legal action for compensation after being acquitted following his second retrial for the murder of his foster daughter Billie-Jo.


Mr Murphy says: ‘The IPCC has said it is committed to improving the quality of its work and we hope that will be the case. However, the vast majority of complaints continue to be investigated by the police with little or no meaningful input from the IPCC. Most internal police complaints departments that I have come across are behaving as though the Police Reform Act never happened.’


Sarah Ricca, a partner in London firm Hickman & Rose’s civil department, is convener of the PALG. ‘Our attitude has been to work with the IPCC to bring the complainants’ perspective to bear on the work it does, to get the best out of the reforms. My assessment so far is that I have seen cases where they have been more robust than the old Police Complaints Authority (PCA) but I couldn’t put it any higher than that.’


Hickman & Rose has acted for clients including the family of Harry Stanley, shot dead in 1999 by police who believed the table leg he was carrying wrapped in a bag was a shotgun, and Azelle Rodney, fatally shot by officers last year. The case has been referred to the Crown Prosecution Service.


Partner Daniel Machover says the Stanley family is ‘incredibly unhappy’ that the IPCC did not recommend disciplinary charges. However, the IPCC has urged the police service to change the way officers write up their accounts of fatal incidents so that firearms officers are treated like any other significant witnesses, and any debrief is video-recorded.


He adds: ‘The question now is whether the IPCC can make a real difference and ensure their recommendations become policy. In the Azelle Rodney case, the commission accepted it has lessons to learn from the way it dealt with his family, but no family wants to be the guinea pig.’


The IPCC has 350 staff, including 140 investigators, four regional offices and a budget of £29 million; it has carried out 82 independent investigations and 290 managed investigations. During the coming financial year, its remit is being increased to take on serious incidents arising out of the work of Revenue & Customs, the Serious Organised Crime Agency and immigration officers when they are exercising arrest powers.


Solicitor John Wadham, former director of Liberty and now the IPCC’s deputy chairman, reckons it is the biggest and most powerful police oversight body in the world. Mr Wadham, who is helping the Home Office draw up a police discipline system modelled on employment law, says: ‘The Stockwell shooting was a significant test for us, which we passed in two senses – in ensuring we carried out the investigation and in doing it more quickly than the police would have done.’


Overall, Mr Wadham argues the commission is more transparent than the PCA, but he accepts there is ‘more to do’. He says: ‘We tell the police to be more open and apologise for their mistakes and learn from them, and we have to take that medicine ourselves. I haven’t always got it right as a commissioner but I hope that the message lawyers are getting is that we want to listen and learn.’


He also agrees it is not enough just to make recommendations. ‘While the decision is not ours to make, it is crucial that we push to see them implemented.’


The Police Federation, which represents 139,000 officers from chief inspector down, supports the principle of independent oversight as a way of resolving allegations of self-interest when the police investigate themselves.


However, police and lawyers have a different take on how the IPCC is working. Andre Clovis, a partner in London firm Christian Khan’s police team, says the commission has some good, committed people. ‘But I think the IPCC’s relationship with the police is still too close. It won’t disclose communications it has with the police to us, but it will disclose what we say, so the complainant is always at a disadvantage.’


On the other hand, Police Federation chairman Jan Berry says: ‘There is a perception among police officers that the IPCC is the complainants’ spokesperson rather than the independent investigator. If they are at a coroner’s court, for instance, the IPCC investigators will talk to the complainant, but won’t be seen to talk to the police. However, we have a good working relationship with the IPCC and it is getting better.’


Asked how she views actions against the police, Ms Berry says: ‘The police are accountable for the actions they take and so I understand it at that level.’ But she is unconvinced that the balance is right because officers are not being properly protected against malicious complaints or those used as defence tactics.


One option the IPCC is keen to pursue is restorative justice. It points out that the Stanley family has never had the opportunity to hear directly from the officer about the effect of his fatal action because of the adversarial climate of the proceedings.


Fiona Murphy, one of the founding partners of London firm Bhatt Murphy, says restorative justice is still a long way off. She explains: ‘I have settled litigation against one force this year on behalf of women victims of a police sergeant who was sentenced to 18 years for rape and other sex offences. But, despite the conviction, the force still sought to defend the civil claim vigorously. That sends entirely the wrong message. We haven’t got to the point where the police have learnt to say sorry at a sufficiently early stage.’


One of the main difficulties in bringing actions against the police is funding. Under the Police Reform Act 2002, civil actions and complaints can be run in parallel. However, the Legal Services Commission (LSC) has made it a condition of receiving certificated public funding that a potential claimant must first lodge a police complaint and allow it to be processed for six months.


Cases are almost exclusively publicly funded because, generally speaking, the police do not tend to target the wealthy, says Mr Murphy. ‘While these cases receive priority within the public funding code, there is an ever decreasing pool of public funds available and the hourly rates have not increased for years.’


Ms Murphy says one positive move on funding is that the LSC has set up a dedicated team in Brighton, which is increasingly developing expertise. ‘Where we have a lot of difficulty is in persuading the LSC to appreciate the level of complexity involved, and care that is needed, in representing bereaved families in custodial deaths inquests.’


The LSC is also more comfortable funding high-value police actions than lower-value claims, Ms Murphy says. ‘Yet the seriousness of the constitutional issues doesn’t necessarily correlate with the level of compensation.


Harriet Wistrich, a solicitor in London firm Birnberg Peirce’s civil department, which acts for the de Menezes family, says there is a lot of pressure to settle. ‘In ten years, I have had only three cases go to trial and I have settled scores.’


She says conditional fee agreements are not an option. ‘One of my colleagues did one and managed to get insurance up to a certain level, and then decided just to carry it on because it was a very interesting point, but it has cost an absolute fortune. I have tried getting insurance for a couple of cases and found it impossible when you are up against a public authority with limitless funds in cases which involve complex issues of policy.’


Do the lawyers who work on these cases find their view of the police becomes tainted? Ms Murphy says: ‘We get to see the very worst and, at times, the very best of policing. On those rare occasions where forces have acknowledged their own failings and endeavoured to address them, one can see how much victims can contribute to achieving a more accountable system.


‘I see our work as being very constructive and, in that sense, very pro-police. However, where the police response is one of defensiveness and inappropriate litigiousness, it can be very frustrating.’


Grania Langdon-Down is a freelance journalist