This is overblown.
The police are responsible for deciding how to classify a report. Their decisions need to be audited to avoid corruption.
Ergo they have to maintain a record of reports they decided were not hate crimes.
The police are responsible for deciding how to classify a report. Their decisions need to be audited to avoid corruption.
Ergo they have to maintain a record of reports they decided were not hate crimes.
I can think of plenty scenarios where these records should be destroyed permanently after some amount of time - namely, if the police decide not to refer to a prosecutor, or if the prosecutor decides not to press charges, or if the defendant is found not guilty.
I would hope that this along with any other disclosure where the police decided on no action would be treated appropriately and only disclosed/acted upon if the incident was really worrying. On the other hand, I can't help but feel if the incident is worrying enough would it not also meet the bar for a criminal incident?
I'm not really comfortable with the naming and the lack of due process to be honest.
On the other hand, being careful what you say on social media is a requisite in many careers as companies can and do perform private background checks.
And as we all know: corruption ends abruptly at the highest levels.