The Police Officer of the Year 2018 identifies and prevents serious threats in advance

Detective Chief Inspector Santeri Sivonen , commanding officer of the UHKAT (Threats) function at the National Bureau of Investigation, has been voted the Police Officer of the Year 2018.

The UHKAT function is tasked with promoting the ability of law enforcement authorities to identify serious threats and individuals causing concern and to prevent serious threatening situations from arising. The UHKAT function participates in the investigation of approximately 400 cases a year.

The objective of the UHKAT function is to reveal and prevent serious targeted violence from happening in as early stages as possible. The function assesses the threat levels of matters revealed and strives to identify individuals raising concerns.

According to the nomination criteria for the Police Officer of the Year, showing an optimistic approach and professional and cooperative skills – being a team player – Detective Chief Inspector Santeri Sivonen has been developing the UHKAT function with determination and at his own initiative.

“Santeri Sivonen has identified and internalized the meaning of extensive cooperation, not only between law enforcement authorities, but also in relation to professionals in various other sectors,” the grounds for the nomination state.

The function supports the local police departments in detecting treats

Detective Chief Inspector Santeri Sivonen commends his own team for their high enthusiasm for work and their professional competence. Every member of the team adds something important to the work done collectively.

“Primarily, the team supports the work of police departments in the identification, detection and prevention of threats of targeted violence,” says Sivonen.

The team participates in the investigation of cases by doing interviews and assessments and by other means, if necessary.

“Our team develops methods and trains police department staffs to recognise threats and to address them in compliance with a joint model.”

Sivonen considers the job done by police departments at the local level central to detecting and preventing threats. In collaboration with local police departments, the team has prevented many serious threatening situations from escalating into more serious events.

Uniform operating models throughout Finland

Nationally applicable models have been created for identifying individuals giving cause for concern. All police departments have the required competence for this work.

“Most of the threats are ones created by individuals causing concern. Once a threat has been identified, an intervention executed by the police or some other actor has a preventive effect on the potential perpetrator's intentions. We have been able to prevent people falling into bad ways with the help of different measures implemented in collaboration between the police, social and health care and other authorities,” Sivonen points out.

The public can contact the police by dropping a hint through the Online tip service, or by reporting the case to a police patrol or the Emergency Response Centre. The concerned party may be people close to the individual, the health care, a physician or a member of the school staff.

Sivonen lists some examples that may give reason for concern in a person’s behaviour.

“Idealization of violence, threatening communications, social problems and problems with coping combined with a worsening life situation. The overall assessment of an individual's life situation is of key importance. No single factor turns a person into a threat to someone else's life or health. The threat arises as a combined effect of several personal and environmental factors.”

In the past year, Sivonen and his team have been involved in the investigation of approximately 400 cases. In addition to these, local police departments have investigated various cases all around Finland.

From a researcher into a police officer

Santeri Sivonen studied social sciences and became a university researcher. While involved in this work, he got interested in police duties and applied to police training.

“In police work, I saw an opportunity to do concrete work with other people. Being a police officer gives me new perspectives on people,” he says.

Sivonen has been working as a police officer for 16 years, the first four of them in monitoring and emergency call duties on the field.

Sivonen worked for a long time in the criminal intelligence and analysis unit (PCB) at the National Bureau of Investigation, consisting of the members of the police, customs and Border Guard staff in 2006-2016. In 2010-2016, Sivonen acted as the team leader of the unit.

In the PCB unit, his duties included preparing different risk and threat assessments, developing operations and forms of cooperation, analyses tasks and cooperation with other authorities.

Since 2016, Sivonen has been working as the commanding officer of the UHKAT function established at the National Bureau of Investigation.

This year’s Police Officer of the Year award is the 43rd of its kind. The recipient is decided by JCI Helsinki, the Finnish Police Federation and the National Police Board.

For pictures of the Police Officer of the Year, please visit the website of the Finnish Police Federation at http://www.spjl.fi/viestinta/mediapankki/kuvapankki