Police disclosing suspects’ ethnicity is fuelling prejudice, say campaigners | Police
Racial justice campaigners say police decisions to reveal the ethnicity and nationality of suspects in high-profile crimes are having a “devastating effect” and helping to spread prejudice.
The warning came from the Runnymede Foundation and 50 other groups in England and Wales calling for the policy to be revoked, in a letter sent to the home secretary and police chiefs on Friday.
Their research shows that the policy, introduced in August, has led to five times more use of the term “asylum seeker” in articles about serious crime than before the policy change.
The groups say the public is given a harmful impression of wrongly linking criminality to ethnicity or immigration status. This feeds prejudice and helps tear the fabric of society even further.
The letter states: “This guidance, which encourages police forces to disclose the ethnicity and nationality of suspects charged in high-profile cases, is having a devastating impact on our country and harming our communities…
“The guidance was presented as an attempt to stamp out misinformation… In practice it had the opposite effect, becoming a catalyst for crime reporting reminiscent of the 1970s and 1980s, reviving a focus on race and immigration status.”
The policy change was decided in August by the College of Policing and the National Police Chiefs’ Council, which set standards in policing.
Far-right social media accounts claimed that the Southport attack in 2024 was carried out by an asylum seeker, leading police to say the attacker was a British citizen. This has largely fueled far-right accusations of two-tiered policing, that police only reveal details of ethnicity and race when suspects are not asylum seekers.
“The suspect’s ethnicity or country of origin is increasingly viewed as more important than the crime itself or the experiences of victims, encouraging a dangerous and misleading connection between race, immigration and criminality,” the letter states.
The call to scrap the policy is backed by Amnesty International UK, the Immigration Law Practitioners Association, the chair of the Independent Review and Oversight Board for the police, the National Police Race Action Plan, the Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants, Jewish Women’s Aid, Freedom, the Muslim Council of Britain and the Inquiry.
Supporting the groups’ concerns, research compared the use of terms such as asylum seeker in 2023 before the policy change and in 2025 after the change.
“Our snapshot analysis…shows an increase in the use of certain descriptors such as foreign nationality, asylum status and ethnicity in crime news. For example, the term ‘asylum seeker’ has increased five-fold in articles about serious crimes,” the letter said.
“These findings demonstrate a pattern in which the ethnicity and immigration status of people accused – or accused of illegal conduct more generally – are increasingly conveyed in ways that represent people of color as inherently criminal.
“This is extremely dangerous and could be seen to encourage the public to perceive ethnicity and immigration status as important factors in the commission of crime. There is no credible academic evidence to support this perception. As a result, the public is presented with an inaccurate and harmful impression that links ethnicity or immigration status to criminality.”
A spokesperson for the Police College said: “Police operate in a challenging environment where accurate and timely information is now essential to prevent gaps being created and the spread of misinformation and disinformation.
“Current interim guidance says information confirming a person’s nationality or ethnicity can be published if it is part of a high-profile or sensitive investigation where there is a policing purpose. This includes risks to public safety, such as increased tensions in the community. There must also be significant media or social media interest before the information is released.”
Some forces decided to release race and nationality details after the arrest. One of the most recent cases was a mass stabbing on a train, where British Transport Police (BTP) made public details of two suspects they had arrested, saying they were both black. One was charged, the other was released without charge, and racial details dominated the hours-long broadcast. Runnymede said more important details, such as how many knives were used in the attack, were not disclosed.
Shabna Begum, director of the Runnymede Trust, said: “Why were they not put out by the police, with the number of weapons used directly related to the crime rather than the ethnicity and race of the suspects?” he said.
The BTP spokesman said the weapon details were announced later. “BTP has chosen to disclose the ethnicity and nationality of the two men arrested in this high-profile case in the interest of transparency and to mitigate the spread of damaging misinformation and speculation,” the spokesperson said.
