The future of the police analyst and EBP

It could be argued that the police analyst has lived through troubled times during the first two decades of the 21st Century. Questions have been raised about the analyst outputs (Belur and Johnson, 2016; Chainey, 2012; Innes et al., 2005) and if they offer any real value. This has also been echoed in the USA (Santos and Taylor, 2014). However, there has also been significant hope in what the analyst can offer too (Kirby and Keay, forthcoming; Piza et al, 2020; Santos, 2014). So, whilst the integration of crime and intelligence analysis continues to gain momentum, in some part, kick-started by the growing emphasis on Evidence Based Policing and Problem Oriented Policing, the analyst role faces new challenges: the future. What does the future have in store for the analyst role? With a greater reliance on technology in an evolving digital world, are the skills required by police analysts meeting these challenges or does the role have to evolve once more to embrace big data and new technology? This chapter examines the evolving role of the analyst and argues that the analyst is perhaps not ready to meet future demand. The chapter will outline what is needed by the analyst and the analyst organisation in order to ensure that the role can develop to meet future demands, both operationally and organisationally.