Five police teams set off shortly after 6am to execute warrants covering child protection and suspected drug offences. Before 7am, someone had been arrested.
Express joined officers as they acted on intelligence – the final stage of a process that can begin with a seemingly insignificant tip-off.
Around 7,000 pieces of intelligence reach Police HQ each year, ranging from suspicious car movements to plans to bring drugs to Jersey on boats and jet-skis.
In this podcast, officers explain how they connect those fragments, build investigations and gather the evidence needed to bring people to court.
DI Callum O’Connor, head of the Joint Intelligence Bureau, encouraged Islanders to report anything suspicious, even if they cannot see how it might help.
“The majority of the time, it is useful,” he said.
Information that initially appears irrelevant can become significant a week or two later, when another member of the public provides a detail that helps identify a person or vehicle.
Agencies ranging from children’s services to the French Gendarmerie can be involved, with police analysts drawing together links between the information received.
Digital forensics specialists also examine computers and phones, helping investigators establish what happened and when.
“The timeline is really important to us because it tells us the chronological story about how events unfolded and how then, we can go out and look for CCTV and things like that,” DI O’Connor explained.
Recalling another investigation, he described how plotting someone’s movements helped officers find CCTV, progress the case and secure a successful court outcome.
DI Paul Ryan, who leads the Joint Financial Crimes Unit and the drugs squad, also outlined the results of police activity in June.
That month, officers executed 17 warrants, made multiple arrests and seized nearly £10,000 in criminal cash, 99 grammes of cocaine, 40 MDMA tablets, 51 grammes of cannabis and 12 plants.
