Sir Stephen House’s tenure at the top of Police Scotland has been beset by criticism since he took the job at the new amalgamated force in 2013.
• The £280,000-a-year police chief came to power having won a turf war with Vic Emery, head of the Scottish Police Authority (SPA), the body charged with overseeing the force. In the wrangle, the SPA lost control of information technology and human resources.
• In the first six months of Sir Stephen’s tenure, 150 officers raided saunas across Edinburgh. The establishments had public entertainment licences and were seen as a way of keeping sex workers safe. Sir Stephen, the former chief constable of Strathclyde police, was accused of imposing a “Glasgow-centric” style of policing across Scotland and failing to understand the arrangements of different areas.
• Shortly after, a row erupted over stop and search, with more than 300,000 incidents in the force’s first five months and 500,000 in its first year. Earlier this year, it was revealed that one in every five people in Glasgow was stopped and searched by police.
The majority of these were non-statutory, meaning officers had no legal basis or reason to suspect those they stopped. Sir Stephen backed down over criticism and promised to reform the policy. Yet in February, it emerged Police Scotland was still using the tactic far more than forces in the rest of the UK.
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• The next battle was over police officers routinely carrying guns on patrol. Members of the public became increasingly vocal about seeing armed officers turn up to non-violent incidents. Despite assurances in October 2014 that the practice would stop, it transpired this March that armed officers had responded to 1,600 routine incidents since.
• Problems for Sir Stephen’s leadership escalated in May with the death of Sheku Bayoh in police custody. The 31-year-old was restrained by up to nine officers during an incident in Kirkcaldy and was pronounced dead hours later in hospital. The Police Investigations and Review Commissioner (Pirc) is investigating.
• Early on July 5, the car carrying John Yuill, 28, and his partner Lamara Bell, 25, careered off a motorway. A man called police to report the incident but officers never followed it up. It took three days, and another call, for the couple to be discovered. Mr Yuill was dead. Ms Bell was still alive, but seriously injured and dehydrated. She died later in hospital.
An urgent review of police call handling is under way. Pirc is also conducting an inquiry into the case.