Lauren’s delight at national story success
Third-year journalism student Lauren Cox achieved national coverage with an investigation into child crime.
Lauren submitted Freedom of Information requests to every police force in the UK asking for the number of suspected crimes committed by those aged under 10.
She received 25 responses and, after some number crunching, worked out that in just over a decade there had been 34,000 crimes committed by children too young to be prosecuted.
With help from a tutor, the story was put out to the nationals via Solent News Agency. It was featured as a double page spread in the Daily Express and even received a mention on the front page. It was also published in the Daily Star, Daily Mirror and Metro.
Lauren, pictured, said: “It took a while to put the story together because I was waiting for responses from the police forces while also trying to contact potential interviewees, and sorting all the data was probably the hardest part.
“It’s been a really rewarding process because I know how much effort I put into it, so seeing my work in the nationals has been a really proud moment.”
