Regional Intelligence Unit (RIU)

The Regional Intelligence Unit (RIU) is part of a national infrastructure set up to provide a meaningful intelligence map of Organised Crime Groups (OCGs) across the UK. Its role is to provide an informed map of cross-border criminal activity.

The RIU works in close proximity with the Serious and Organised Crime Agency (SOCA) and HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) tackling cross-border criminality, sharing expertise and intelligence to greater effect.

The unit can link into national and international portals through its contacts within SOCA and with other RIUs across the country. It supplies up-to-date information and mapping data about Organised Criminal Groups through its own intelligence gathering sources and also through other forces and regions about criminal gangs migrating into the Yorkshire and Humber area in order to minimise the potential they may cause to local neighbourhoods and communities.

The role of the Regional Intelligence Unit is to identify where an intervention needs to be made to prevent harm locally by identifying the supply chain of criminal activity and stemming the source, be that drugs, people trafficking or illegal firearms. This timely intervention works to protect local communities.

The focus for the RIU is to disrupt crime and upset criminal networks by making life difficult for enduring criminals. To do this effectively, the team has to have an informed picture and used modern technologies and innovative practices to tackle sophisticated criminal groups and their networks.

Although a small team, the Regional Intelligence Unit is a resource for deployment across the whole of Yorkshire and the Humber supplying support for Business Crime Units and Force Intelligence Bureaux across the region and working in partnership with SOCA and HMRC.

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Assistant Chief Constable, Max Sahota, of South Yorkshire Police is Chair and leads the Heads of Crime Group. He is also the Chair for the Regional Tactical Tasking & Coordinating Group (RTTCG) and has overall responsibility for pushing forward the regional agenda in respect of serious and organised crime.

“We have now set up a Heads of Crime Group where the Heads of CID for each of the four forces are working closely together to identify areas for collaboration. This is to improve our capacity and capability to tackle serious and organised crime and major crime. West Yorkshire is leading on Serious and Organised Crime (SOC) South Yorkshire is leading on investigating Major Crime. North Yorkshire is concentrating on areas of intelligence and tasking and Humberside is focussing upon crime support.

“We are developing business cases for specific areas of business and these will be agreed by the Regional Chief Constables’ Group (RCCG) later this year. A key part of this process is to develop the role of the Regional Intelligence Unit (RIU) and the Regional Tactical Tasking & Coordinating Group (RTTCG). The beginning of June saw the first meeting of the new Regional Tactical Tasking & Coordinating Group and feedback has been very positive.

“We are maintaining our focus on organised crime groups but also striking the balance with those offences that are impacting across borders such as distraction burglaries and two-in-ones.

“Operation Impact is now a recognised brand across Yorkshire and the Humber and we intend to integrate this within the Regional tasking and Coordinating Group framework to ensure we effectively coordinate our efforts.

“The RIU is currently analysing information from the four force intelligence bureaux about active Organised Crime Groups across force borders with a view to disrupting their activities and reducing the harm caused to local communities and neighbourhoods. We have found in other areas of policing that shared expertise, knowledge and best practice is having a positive effect in how we tackle cross-border criminality. No doubt such results can be replicated with a proactive approach to shared intelligence.”