Refurbished police custody suite in Skegness means ‘positive impact on quality of investigative process’

A police custody suite has been given a makeover.

Lincolnshire Police’s new Chief Constable Paul Gibson was in Skegness today (May 10) for the opening of the recently refurbished custody suite.

The purpose of the renovation was to bring the suite up to current specifications and guidelines, as well as meet recommendations made by HMICFRS, His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services, following their inspection of our custody suites in May 2022.

Speaking at the opening, Chief Constable Gibson said: “The impact of these refurbishments means that we are not only treating prisoners with dignity and respect, but there will also be improved handling of evidence and improved working conditions for our staff and partners, which is bound to have a tremendously positive impact on the quality of our investigative process."

Skegness custody has only had remedial repairs over the years and most of the mechanical and ventilation systems were at the end of life, so when the force had the opportunity to carry out a full refurbishment of the suite it was a chance to future-proof the suite and bring it up to the latest ministry of justice specification.

The work saw improvements of the heating and ventilation system; installation of new panic alarm, fire alarm, and CCTV systems, as well as a new intercom.

Bringing the custody suite up to correct specification also enables police to capture the best evidence for investigations.

It offers improvements to the medical room, interview rooms, and rooms where we take biometrics such as fingerprints and DNA.

The heating plant for the custody suite was coming to the end of its life so it was updated to run on air source heat pumps, which aligns with the force’s decarbonisation strategy.

It also means that custody is now not reliant on natural gas for the heating and reduces the heating load on the boilers that supply heating to the station.

The force fitted a call system to the cells so the detainees can communicate with the custody desk, which will enable custody staff to communicate with the detainees immediately, rather than having to go to cells every time the detainee presses a button.

Police now have a new fully computerised panic alarm system, rather than just lights on a board.

The CCTV system has had the latest high-definition cameras installed - these have also been repositioned to avoid blind spots.

The old corridor to the magistrates’ court has been used to create a third interview room which is equipped with a full video interview system, and new furniture as also been installed in all interview rooms.

The Boston custody suites will be next in line for a refurb.

Police used prisoner vans based within the East Lindsey area to transport any prisoners to the other suites (mainly Boston or Lincoln) whilst the Skegness suite was closed.

This van was staffed by two police officers, using overtime to help with this.

This enabled police to keep staff located in the East Lindsey areas to be able to respond to incidents immediately, rather than them being potentially indisposed transporting prisoners to Boston or Lincoln.