ABSTRACT
Theories might assist, but for the research to offer validity, it would need to be grounded in the day-to-day context of the working UK police environment and provide analysis of identified examples. The term 'commit suicide' invokes connotations of committing a crime and was therefore seen as appropriate until 1961, when suicide was decriminalised. To gain an understanding of suicide in the UK police service, it would be essential to be informed by those as close to the situation as possible. A comment by Violanti was helpful in determining the methodology: 'police officers may be better informed if they know the inherent risk of police suicide in a quantitative, qualitative, and contextual sense'. Identification of potential case-studies was undertaken through searching media reports in publications such as Police Oracle and Federation News. To examine and analyse the individual case-studies, the research adopted grounded-theory principles to assimilate the gathered details and to identify any common trends.
