Crimebusters alert

June 9, 2006 12:53 PM

I was interested in how I could find information about a crime that supposedly occurred in London or Cambridge in 1993.

The note I have of this is from Thursday May 13th, 1993. This note says a teenager was raped on Sunday morning at 3:58 am (London time). It is possible that Sunday morning is being described as late Saturday night, or else as late Sunday night (i.e., Monday morning). Since the note is from May 13th, 1993, the crime would probably have occurred on one of the following dates:

Sunday (late night) May 9th.
Monday (early morning) May 10th.

Sunday (late night) May 2nd.
Monday (early morning) May 3rd.

or, less likely:

Sunday April 25th.
Monday, April 26th.

Would such a crime appear in the newspapers? I'm not interested in information that would compromise the victim's identity or any grisly details, just confirmation that this did take place and when.

posted by dances_with_sneetches to law & government (9 comments total)

If you have a reasonable reason to request this information, then the police is your best bet. They do keep records that far back.
posted by seawallrunner at 1:01 PM on June 9, 2006

Okay, would the police be the people? Being London do I have to know which "precinct?" Does such a thing apply or is there a general unit for the city?
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 2:02 PM on June 9, 2006

London or Cambridge? That takes in a huge stretch of south-east England and about twelve million people.

You'll need more than that. It's like saying it happened in "New York City or Albany".

It's possible there would be ten different crimes that matched those criteria given the spread of geography, the spread of ages that match "teenage" and the spread of time.

You would definitely have to narrow it down to a particular area before you could talk to the police, I'd assume.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 2:11 PM on June 9, 2006

A lot of local newspapers (at least in the USA) publish daily or weekly crime logs. perhaps you could convince some bored English librarian to troll through a couple of them for you.
posted by muddgirl at 4:08 PM on June 9, 2006

I disagree Ambrose. The time is very specific, there is no spread of times, it is at one of those dates, and presumably at 3:58 am. I'm not saying London to Cambridge, I'm talking about one or the other. That still means a population of about 6 million (guessing). While the population may be large, the rate of rape in England in 1993 was 0.2 per 1000 per year (for females). So we're talking about 1200 per year or 4 per day. From that, maybe it could be done to match up one at 3:58 am, or maybe that info isn't in the papers. That's why I'm asking - do people there know if it would be in the papers, for example, or would such crimes be routinely omitted because they occur at 4 per day over the population?
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 5:53 PM on June 9, 2006

I'm not saying London to Cambridge, I'm talking about one or the other. That still means a population of about 6 million (guessing).

OK, I take your point about the time. But you really are guessing about the population. The population of London is well over 6 million. I'd say 8 as a shorthand, depending exactly what you call London.

Would it be in the papers? Not in the national papers or even the London papers unless it was a particularly notable crime for some reason. It would only be in a local paper, so you're back to needing more detail.

There is of course a headquarters for the policing of the whole of London and you could just call them, but I can't imagine they would search a database for all crimes commited at 3.58AM on certain days, if such a database even exists. They'd want to have a very good reason and a request in writing probably.

I have to say, I'm intrigued. Any more detail you can give?
posted by AmbroseChapel at 12:12 AM on June 10, 2006

How you proceed now rather depends upon
1) how much extra information you have, if any - i.e. the author of the note, or more details of the crime
2) whether you wish to risk turning in the author
3) whether you live in the UK

BTW, if the time is given as 3.58AM on sunday (or sunday morning), that's pretty likely to literally mean the early morning of Sunday in the UK - i.e. after midnight saturday. It's possible to be the other interpretation, but unusual here.

If you do decide to contact the police - and I would recommend it - you have several choices.

The Metropolitan Police cover London, and they have a specific site for rape/sexual assault. You can either contact them on the non-emergency crime website, or phone them at crimestoppers at 00 44 800 555 111. The non-emergency crime website doesn't mention rape as a suitable crime to report, but the Sapphire site directly points to it, so it should be valid.

Both of those methods are national, i.e. not regionally tied, and theoretically will have access to the national crime database.
If you did want to contact the Cambridge police force, they can be found here

It's also worth asking why you want to know. It would be difficult to prosecute a rape after such a time, but not impossible - assuming the victim went to the police and reported it. Remember, a majority of rapes go unreported, and this was even more the case in the early 90's. If you're doing this to find out if someone you know actually did what was claimed in the note, the police may not have a record it, even if it did happen.

Still, I would recommend reporting it to them - they'll probably want a copy of the note - and they may have more information and/or a casefile on it.

As far as newspapers go tho, if the assault did make it, it would be very light on details, and likely only make it to the local press. Without knowing the borough of london, it's not likely to be a useful direction. If you do get really stuck though, I have a few friends in central london I might be able to bribe for a few hours research.
posted by ArkhanJG at 3:35 AM on June 10, 2006

Oh, it's worth pointing out that crimestoppers isn't actually the police per se, but a charity that allows the anonymous reporting of details of a crime, which does then get passed to the police. They have a website here.
posted by ArkhanJG at 3:43 AM on June 10, 2006

ArkhanJG, my profile has my email if you are interested in further details. I am composing an email for Ambrose.

Thanks.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 8:08 AM on June 10, 2006