Ankle tags used to target young black men, London mayor’s report finds

Almost a quarter of knife crime offenders tagged on release from London prisons last year were black British Caribbean, and 16% were black African. Photograph: Mark Richardson/Alamy

Electronic ankle tags are being used to racially target and sentence young black men for knife crime offences in a way that “may reflect unconscious bias” among Metropolitan police officers, according to internal documents from the mayor of London’s office.

In an equality analysis assessment obtained through a freedom of information request, the mayor’s office for policing and crime (Mopac), which has oversight for the Met, acknowledged that the use of GPS-enabled monitoring tags “may reflect unconscious bias within probation risk assessments … that are more likely to link BAME young men to risk and serious criminality”.