Registered Sex Offenders

Freedom of Information (FOI) Act request ref: 01/FOI/26/009753/G

Version Date: 21/04/2026

The Vulnerability Department has provided the following information:

I am seeking updated figures relating to registered sex offenders, following data previously obtained by BBC news via FOI requests that were reported on in March 2023 (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-64624921).

I would like to request the most recent available data between 2021 to present on:
The number of registered sex offenders recorded as:
•           Missing, or
•           Wanted for arrest

Please note, this data can only be captured on a single date of a year, not a total for the 365 days. The figures provided are taken from the 1 January of each year.

The number of registered sex offenders who have:
•           Notified police of a name change or alias

Please note that multiple changes could be updated at once (name/bank details/ address). When entering this on ViSOR we can only select one ‘reason’ for the notification even if multiple updates are notified. The data provided shows all where the reason was ‘name change’ however there are likely others updated as part of a larger update that were recorded with a different reason and will therefore not be captured.

The number of offences relating to:
•           Breaches of notification requirements
If possible, please provide:
•           Annual figures broken down by year
•           Data in the same format/categories as previously supplied in response to FOI requests used in the BBC report

The data for breaches is as at 1 April for each year and will only contain results for registered sex offenders (RSO) we own now. It is entirely possible that an RSO convicted of a breach of notification requirements in 2022 was managed and prosecuted by another force and has since moved to D&C Police. It is also possible that RSOs we manage & prosecute for the same have since moved force/ been archived.