A serious Case: Police priorities in criminal investigations
SCALE
- 791,000 new crime cases recorded by the police in 2024; 755,300 finished processing.
- EUR 8.1 billion total police expenditure in 2024, representing 32% of the Ministry of Justice and Security's budget.
- Over 10,000 CHI-serious crime reports were not processed in 2024, including 1,600 that had been prioritised by the Public Prosecution Service or the minister.
- 12,300 FTE deployed on major national or international criminal investigations in 2024 - with results unknown for all of them.
PERFORMANCE ASPECT
- Alignment of investigation priorities with the Crime Harm Index (CHI).
- Regional consistency in processing serious crime reports.
- Traceability of investigation results and costs to statutory tasks and stated priorities.
- Audit approach: analysis of police and Public Prosecution Service data and registration systems, and review of ministerial and commissioner policy documents.
1. Investigation priorities not calibrated to crime severity (CHI)
Goal-setting Regulatory system
The minister has prioritised cybercrime and other online crime, whereas these crimes have only low or moderate CHI scores (Exec. summary pp.4-5; Sec.3.5 pp.16-19, Fig. 6). A Goal-setting gap: objectives were set (Security Agenda 2023-2026; PPS Investigation Guidelines 2013) without calibration against harm/severity evidence, operating independently of the Regulatory system the Court's own index provides.
2. 10,000 serious crime reports left unprocessed despite prioritisation
Procedures Responsibility Monitoring
In 2024, over 10,000 reported crimes regarded by the CHI as serious were not processed by the police; of these, 1,600 had been prioritised (Exec. summary pp.5-6, Fig. 1; Sec.4.2-4.3 pp.22-26, Fig. 8) by the Public Prosecution Service or the minister. A screening Procedure that exists but is not reliably executed, with no party holding Responsibility for tracking whether prioritised cases are carried through, and no Monitoring mechanism surfacing the gap before audit.
3. BOSZ/Summ-IT registration systems cannot trace priorities to results
Documentation Tools Reporting
"BOSZ uses different definitions from those used by the Public Prosecution Service... the registration system makes it impossible to monitor the extent to which police investigation results align with priorities" (Sec.5.1 pp.29-30). A Documentation failure - records do not encode the categories needed to check policy against practice - compounded by inadequate Tools and a consequent Reporting gap.
4. Results of 11,500 major investigations unknown
Monitoring Results review
The police have no information available on the outcomes of the 11,500 major national or international criminal investigations (Exec. summary p.6, Fig. 2; Sec.5.1 p.30, Fig. 12) carried out by over 12,300 FTE. No systematic Monitoring of throughput or outcomes for this capacity, and no Results review comparing investigation outcomes against objectives once cases close.
5. Serious crimes increasingly assigned to under-equipped frontline teams
Responsibility Human capital Training Design
The Justice and Security Inspectorate (2025) concluded that frontline teams were not properly equipped to handle these more serious, complex forms of crime (Exec. summary p.7; Sec.5.2 pp.31-32, Fig. 13-14). A Responsibility drift - task allocation shifted from the designed division of labour under capacity pressure - meeting a Human capital and Training shortfall, without a Design re-engineering of the process to match.
6. No insight into police spending per statutory task
Finance Reporting Documentation
The police's administration system does not break down costs by statutory task; neither the minister nor the commissioner can state or establish how much public money is spent on each of these statutory tasks separately (Exec. summary p.7; Sec.5.3 pp.32-34, Fig. 15). The EUR 8.1 billion Finance commitment is a single figure that Reporting and Documentation cannot decompose for parliamentary or management use.
7. Regional inconsistency in processing serious crime reports
Procedures Design
Rotterdam police, for example, immediately dismissed a relatively high number (19%) of serious crimes reported (Sec.3.4 p.15; Sec.4.4 pp.26-27, Table 3, Fig. 11), compared with East-Netherlands (12%) and Limburg (11%). The same national objective is operationalised inconsistently across regional Procedures, reflecting unharmonised local Design choices ('dynamic steering' versus 'operational-coordination points').
Control focus
| ICS phase | Control function | Cases |
|---|---|---|
| Initial phase | Goal-setting | 1. Investigation priorities not calibrated to crime severity (CHI) |
| Responsibility | 2. 10,000 serious crime reports left unprocessed despite prioritisation<br/>5. Serious crimes increasingly assigned to under-equipped frontline teams | |
| Training | 5. Serious crimes increasingly assigned to under-equipped frontline teams | |
| Design | 5. Serious crimes increasingly assigned to under-equipped frontline teams<br/>7. Regional inconsistency in processing serious crime reports | |
| Entity in its environment | Regulatory system | 1. Investigation priorities not calibrated to crime severity (CHI) |
| Human capital | 5. Serious crimes increasingly assigned to under-equipped frontline teams | |
| Finance | 6. No insight into police spending per statutory task | |
| Work processes | Procedures | 2. 10,000 serious crime reports left unprocessed despite prioritisation<br/>7. Regional inconsistency in processing serious crime reports |
| Monitoring | 2. 10,000 serious crime reports left unprocessed despite prioritisation<br/>4. Results of 11,500 major investigations unknown | |
| Tools | 3. BOSZ/Summ-IT registration systems cannot trace priorities to results | |
| Functions applied to all stages | Documentation | 3. BOSZ/Summ-IT registration systems cannot trace priorities to results<br/>6. No insight into police spending per statutory task |
| Reporting | 3. BOSZ/Summ-IT registration systems cannot trace priorities to results<br/>6. No insight into police spending per statutory task | |
| Completion of process | Results review | 4. Results of 11,500 major investigations unknown |
Compliance focus
- Police Act 2012 - establishes the statutory division of police tasks and responsibilities in the Netherlands.
- Public Prosecution Service Investigation Guidelines, 2013 (Aanwijzing voor de opsporing) - setting national investigation priorities.
- Minister of Justice and Security's Security Agenda 2023-2026 - the government's own priority-setting instrument.
- Ministry of Justice and Security's budget line for police expenditure (Budget article 31).
osie/domains_publicActivities.xml, osie/portfolio_CUBE.xml, osie/control_ICS-AuditingIC.xml, osie/functions_organizational.xml, osie/qualityConditions.xml) and the internal-control terminology of INTOSAI's Guidance on Auditing Internal Control (ICS), drafted by the Internal Control Standards Subcommittee, which NIK (Poland) chairs. Underlying data: alg_crimeIndex.xml (dokAAPp.xsd instance). All readers are encouraged to consult the original report (linked above).