Title: What happens to evidence once a police case is closed? - Quora
Headings: What happens to evidence once a police case is closed?
What happens to evidence once a police case is closed?
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Will the police let me know when an investigation is closed?

Content: What happens to evidence once a police case is closed? - Quora
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17 Answers
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, Just retired police Officer at East Anglia (1990-present)
Answered 4 years ago · Author has 5.1K answers and 8.4M answer views
Lower level stuff (assaults, burglaries, public order, thefts etc) then chances are there won’t be there much physical evidence, mostly statements and some CCTV sometimes. If they were convicted or pleaded guilty then the paperwork gets scanned and deep stored electronically, CCTV tends to be discarded unless the sentence is beyond a certain prison sentence (can’t recall exactly, 3 years comes to mind from recent ACPO guidance) - clothing, weapons and the like, if it was never used in the trial will be returned or destroyed, if it was and the sentence is small, probably still returned or destro
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Lower level stuff (assaults, burglaries, public order, thefts etc) then chances are there won’t be there much physical evidence, mostly statements and some CCTV sometimes. If they were convicted or pleaded guilty then the paperwork gets scanned and deep stored electronically, CCTV tends to be discarded unless the sentence is beyond a certain prison sentence (can’t recall exactly, 3 years comes to mind from recent ACPO guidance) - clothing, weapons and the like, if it was never used in the trial will be returned or destroyed, if it was and the sentence is small, probably still returned or destroyed. Cash isn’t really evidence as such, it is more regarded as illegally obtained assets, so it would have been paid into a holding account pending trial ending and if court orders forfeiture it is then transferred into a Constabulary seizure account to be forwarded to the Home Office who do what they see fit with it. For higher end offences, often evidence may go to deep storage, again there are timescales for this, 7 years or more potentially. If the case is closed because there are no leads, it is unsolved, then for low level stuff it becomes something of an investigative decision by the officer in the case (OIC).