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8. Background note

  1. Under the Police Reform Act 2002, forces in England and Wales have a statutory duty to refer to the IOPC all deaths during or following police contact where there is an allegation or indication that police contact, directly or indirectly, contributed to the death. We consider the circumstances of all referrals and decide whether an investigation is necessary.
     
  2. Since April 2006, the IOPC, previously the IPCC, has also received mandatory referrals for cases where someone has died during or following contact with:

  • His Majesty’s Revenue and Customs known as HMRC (Regulation 34 of the Revenue and Customs (Complaints and Misconduct) Regulations 2005).

  • The Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority known as the GLAA (Regulation 36 of the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority (Complaints and Misconduct) Regulations 2017).

  • The Serious Organised Crime Agency (later replaced by the National Crime Agency). 

    Since October 2013, we have also received mandatory referrals from the National Crime Agency (NCA). Up until March 2013, we received cases from the UK Border Agency (UKBA) (Regulation 25 of the UK Border Agency (Complaints and Misconduct) Regulations 2010). At this time, UKBA’s executive agency status ended. Its functions were brought back into the Home Office as UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI); UK Immigration Enforcement (UKIE); and UK Border Force (UKBF). The IOPC continues to have jurisdiction over these officials and contractors.

    From 1 May 2024, we have received mandatory referrals from the Independent Commission for Reconciliation and Information Recovery (ICRIR). Therefore, this report includes deaths during or following contact with staff from all of these organisations.

  1. The IOPC replaced the IPCC in January 2018. This change was set out in the Policing and Crime Act 2017. 
     
  2. From 1 May 2025, we have received mandatory referrals from the National Food Crime Unit within the Food Standards Agency (the Food Crime Officers (Complaints and Misconduct) Regulations 2025). 

Changes and revisions

  1. In 2010/11, a change was made to the definition of the ‘other deaths following police contact’ category. It now includes only those deaths following police contact that were investigated independently by the IOPC (or previously by the IPCC). As a result, we changed the way this category is presented in this report. You can find out more in our guidance document. No other changes were made to the definitions of the death categories.
     
  2. In 2007, the IPCC issued an operational advice note to forces to address inconsistencies in the referral of ‘apparent suicides following release from police custody’. Forces were asked to refer any suicides that happened within two days of release from police custody, or apparent suicides that happened more than two days after release, but where there was a possible link between the time the person spent in custody and their death.
     

  3. This report presents the most up-to-date set of figures for each death category. In this release, five fatalities have been added to previous year’s figures. The following adjustments have been made to the trend figures:

    For 2024/25, one death was added to the ‘deaths in or following police custody’ figure, three deaths were added to the ‘other deaths during or following police contact’ figure and one death was added to the 'apparent suicides following police custody' figure.

    For 2023/24 one death was added to the the ‘other deaths during or following police contact’ figure.

    For 2022/23, one death was added to the ‘other deaths during or following police contact’ figure.

    For 2021/22, two deaths were added to the 'road traffic fatalities' figure and one death was added to the ‘deaths in or following police custody’ figure.

    Where cases have been added, this is because they were either not subject to an independent investigation or had not been referred to us when the report for that financial year was released, or because the organisation has subsequently received information that means the death now meets the definition for the relevant category within the report. In line with our revisions policy, in these instances, the figures for the published annual report were not amended.
     

  4. Table 6.1 sets out the reasons for detention for apparent suicides following police custody. In previous years, this table showed the number of fatalities with footnotes to highlight where there were additional reasons for detention. Owing to the high volume of fatalities with multiple reasons for detention in 2025/26, the figures shown in Table 6.1 are the total number of different reasons for detention. We have used this approach since our 2018/19 report.

Methods and definitions

  1. See our guidance document for detailed definitions and information about how the death cases are categorised and recorded. This document also provides suggestions for further reading.

Policies and statements

  1. We produce a number of policies and statements in connection with this report. These are available on our website. They include information about: 
  • confidentiality and security of data 
  • statement of administrative sources 
  • revisions policies 
  • announcing changes to methods 
  • quality assurance 
  • pre-release access 
  • user engagement strategy 
  • pricing policy 

Users, uses and engagement

  1. Information about key users of the data contained in this report, and how it was used, can be found in the user engagement feedback document. It also summarises any feedback received on the annual deaths report, our response to it, and any impact this may have on either the information contained in the report or the data collection process.
     
  2. This report provides data and information about a highly sensitive topic area. It is used to promote and inform debate and discussion among police forces and other stakeholders and interested parties. It provides users with an opportunity to learn from the cases that appear in the report and to identify, take action, and/or review policy to help prevent such deaths from happening again, where possible.
     
  3. We also produce in-depth studies and learning publications to support learning.
     
  4. Users of these statistics should take care when looking at the time series data tables. There may be discontinuities (such as jumps, gaps or another abrupt change in data) owing to changes in category definition and the varied nature of the circumstances of the cases. The small numbers involved also mean readers should be cautious about drawing conclusions from trend analysis, as variances can be large.

    We make every effort to make sure that all relevant deaths are included in this report through an extensive validation exercise with internal colleagues and police forces. However, at times, a case may come to light after the report is published. Read our revision policies for information about how we manage routine amendments and errors to published data.

    While comparisons to other countries and jurisdictions can be made, users should take care because the data is unlikely to be directly comparable. This is because of differences in death classifications, or how other details were collated.
     
  5. The user engagement strategy is found in section eight of the policies and statements document.

Further information

  1. All our annual reports on deaths in or following police contact are available.
     
  2. Electronic versions of the tables in this report are available on our website. In addition, time series tables are available. These look at the ethnicity, age, and gender of the people who died, and the forces involved. The time series tables are arranged by the category of death, from 2004/05 up to the current reporting year.
     
  3. In addition to our annual reports on deaths, we also produce research studies that examine some of the issues associated with these cases. These studies are available on the research and information pages of our website.
     
  4. Following a recommendation by the National Statistician in 2012, this annual report was assessed by the UK Statistics Authority and granted National Statistics designation.
     
  5. Email [email protected] if you have any questions or comments about our annual death reports. 
     
  6. Estimated publication date for our next report covering data for 2026/27 is summer 2027.