Obtaining unmarked police car number plates using the Freedom of Information Act 910

Well here are the results, and they are fairly predictable:

Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002 Request for information

Your request has been considered and a decision taken to decline to disclose the information requested. This e-mail communication therefore represents a refusal notice in terms of Section 16 of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. Central Scotland Police hold the information requested, but claim exemptions under Sections 35(1) (Law enforcement) and 39(1) (Health and safety) of the Freedom of Information (Scotland) Act 2002. Section 35(1) states that "information is exempt information if its disclosure under this Act would, or would be likely to, prejudice substantially the prevention or detection of crime and the apprehension or prosecution of offenders". The release of the registration marks of unmarked police vehicles would, by alerting criminals to the idenbreasties of those vehicles, enable them to act to avoid effective surveillance, facilitate their evasion of operations designed to detect criminal activity, and substantially prejudice the chances of apprehending those individuals or gangs and bringing them to justice. It is therefore clearly in the public interest that the requested information not be placed in the public domain. Section 39(1) states that "information is exempt information if its disclosure under this Act would, or would be likely to, endanger the physical or mental health or the safety of an individual". The disclosure of the registration marks of unmarked Central Scotland Police vehicles into the public domain would, by alerting criminals to the idenbreasty of those vehicles, endanger the safety of the officers using them. The public interest in the disclosure of the requested information, in so far as it would increase the openness and transparency of public authorities, is heavily outweighed by that in maintaining the exemptions claimed.

-- Jeffrey Spoon