This paper presents findings from an interdisciplinary criminological oral history project on the Lockerbie Disaster, 1988. The deliberate bombing of the Pan American World Airways flight PA103 (Pan Am 103) en-route from London Heathrow to New York JFK on December 21st 1988 remains the worst case of mass murder in Scottish legal history. A bomb was detonated in the fuselage of the aircraft, causing mid-air disintegration and the death of all 259 passengers and crew on board. The vast majority of the wreckage landed in the town of Lockerbie in the Scottish Borders, resulting in a further eleven fatalities. Responsibility for the crime scene investigation and recovery operation – both of unprecedented scale – lay firmly with one of the smallest police forces in Britain: Dumfries and Galloway Constabulary.

This paper draws primarily upon data from oral history interviews with Scottish police officers who responded to the Lockerbie disaster, supplemented by extensive archival research conducted at the Pan Am Flight 103/Lockerbie Air Disaster Archives at Syracuse University, New York. Collectively, the analysis of these narratives offers empirically grounded insights into police culture in often overlooked contexts of mass trauma, contributing to interdisciplinary approaches to the study of policing communities. This paper highlights how existing cultural accounts of rural policing in Scotland have not considered the specific case of Lockerbie, which presents a unique case from which to unpack rural police culture and the relationship between police officers and local communities in rural settings. In doing so it highlights the unique contribution of oral history and archival research in the study of policing and police culture.

In Trinidad and Tobago, there is significant reliance on the traditional and centralized police service to engage in crime response and suppression in urban and rural areas. In this regard, policing scholarship has largely focused on the impact of policing within urban areas, producing a gap in knowledge on what policing rural spaces entails. Despite this, there is some understanding that policing rural spaces can engender diverse challenges and calls for variability in policing strategies. The current study examines the lived experiences of police officers stationed in rural communities in Trinidad and Tobago. Using the descriptive phenomenological approach, semi-structured interviews were conducted with eleven police officers stationed in rural communities throughout the
country. Interviewees narrated the importance of community dynamics and community-specific needs in shaping their roles and functions when operating in and serving these communities. Interviews identified three major themes: (1) network activity in policing; (2) engagement in localistic and service-oriented approaches and (3) community-specific challenges. The findings suggest that while there is an emphasis on traditional law enforcement responsibilities, in the rural context, police responsibilities and duties are constantly being redefined, reframed, and broadened to meet the contextual community and geographic-specific diversities and demands. This research signals an interesting starting point for understanding policing in the Global South and provides impetus for exploring more community and locality-focused policing approaches.

We have conducted two studies of the same relatively safe and moderately prosperous town - Macclesfield in north-west England – 25 years apart. Our study of crime-talk in the town, conducted from 1994-96, explored how worries about crime featured in local social relations (Girling et al. 2000, Crime and Social Change in Middle England). We returned in 2019, following a quarter of a century of technological, socio-economic, cultural and political change, with a view to using the town as a site for exploring what it means to be and feel secure in Britain today. In so doing, we have discovered or observed various forms of social marginality and suffering in the town. These include assorted private harms (domestic abuse, isolation, scamming, drug addiction and exploitation) and vulnerability in public spaces (homelessness, drug use/dealing, neglected and vulnerable youth). Managing the town’s social margins is central to the quotidian work of local statutory and voluntary agencies, including the police. But how do those living in relative comfort and safety in this town perceive and respond to social suffering? How does vulnerability register in people’s consciousness and sense of place, and what demands for governance does it provoke? In this paper, we describe the competing repertoires that marginality provokes (care, concern, attention, discomfort, disgust, denial etc.) with a view to deciphering the place of social suffering in local narrations of the present condition and future prospects of the town and the wider world.

This paper presents a methodological case study based on research conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown that explored how women, who had reported domestic abuse and/or stalking to the police, experienced the processes of the Scottish Criminal Justice System (SCJS). Both domestic abuse and stalking are widely understood as courses of conduct that reduce the amount of power and control a victim/survivor has over their life. Therefore, it was critical to ensure power inequalities between the researchers and participants were minimised in order that the research did not inadvertently replicate the power and control dynamics faced by victim/survivors during their abuse. It was imperative to design research methods that were rigorous but compassionate and appropriate for use during periods of lockdown and social distancing as well as accessible for an often considered ‘hard to reach’ population. This paper will describe how mixed methods (in this case, an online survey and online interviews using the Free Associative Narrative Method) were used within the context of a feminist methodology, to ensure researcher bias and power inequalities were minimized, participant control and choice was maximized, and victim/survivor voices were heard. In particular, we will detail the design of our survey and the modifications that were made to make it as welcoming, safe, and as accessible as possible which included the incorporation of an introductory video of the researchers. The presentation will reflect on participant feedback about the survey and will discuss the successes and challenges of conducting research in this way. The paper will end with recommendations and ‘issues to consider’ for those who may wish to incorporate these methods into their research.