Day In the Life - TOEX Technical Lead
This feature piece has been written by TOEX Technical Lead, DCI Pat Thompson, following questions posed by the TOEX network.
It will be a regular article in the e-magazine exploring the range of roles TOEX staff do across the network.
What opportunity or event made you passionate about data/tech within policing?
The honest answer is a combination of the government’s change to police pension regulations and a divorce! Those two events happened within a relatively short space of time. I had completed 12 years in policing and decided, given the pension changes and my domestic circumstances, to check whether policing was still the right career.
I looked at job adverts and came across a cyber security role with a ridiculously high salary attached. The role criteria meant nothing to me, but I decided to see whether I could break into private‑sector cyber security. I applied for a career break and, alongside studying for some relevant qualifications, worked through several jobs that ultimately landed me in a cyber security role in a fintech company.
I hated it. I quickly missed the “public good” side of policing, so when the career break came to an end, I resigned from that role and returned to being a DC.
Fortunately, my home force was about to start a programme of change around force‑level approaches to digital investigation and digital forensics. I was asked to lead on that, which resulted in a two‑and‑a‑half‑year role where I was given a huge amount of freedom to redefine how my force approached digital content in crime enquiries. I was also able to lean into the digital elements of the Op Soteria review.
Those combined experiences led me to the TOEX role.
What are your goals for the TOEX technical team over the next five years?
There are three things I want to achieve in the next couple of years:
Restructure the Technical Team
For years, policing has stated that law enforcement cannot recruit and retain technical staff due to the salary gap with the private sector. I don’t believe that is true; the longevity of many of our technical team members speaks for itself. However, I do believe the staff side of policing lacks depth and opportunity. I want to deliver a structure that mirrors the Constable → Sergeant → Inspector progression, with the ability to specialise in applications development, data science, or a broader all‑round data role (similar to the DIA role).
Deliver Operation Beaconport
Delivering a national data collection, analysis, and reporting exercise against the backdrop of a national inquiry is both terrifying and exciting. There is clear value to be had, and I’m really enjoying being part of it.
Open the Capabilities Environment (CE) to the wider service
With the exception of Client Eye, every CE application to date has grown from TOEX requirements and TOEX ideas. There are countless excellent ideas across policing, and I want the CE to become a place where non‑TOEX teams can deliver their concepts in collaboration with us.
How did you progress into a more technical career path, and what guidance would you offer to others?
Outside the career break, I’ve invested a lot of my own time into learning. Between 2019 and 2023, I completed two MSc courses (Criminology and Computing Science). Both were driven by a huge amount of imposter syndrome at different points in my career. I feel uncomfortable leading teams without being credible in what those teams do, and I believe that to be credible to both policing and technical colleagues, you need to demonstrate ability — hence the education and also retaining an operational DI footprint in force for weekend and on-call rotas.
This has now led me to a doctorate, again partly driven by imposter syndrome in the AI space, and partly because I’ve come to genuinely enjoy learning.
My advice for anyone wanting to move into a technical space is simple: be passionate. Hard work and passion open the right doors — but because the hard work really is hard, you need the passion to sustain it.
Are there any resources or learning platforms that helped you develop your technical expertise?
For those who learn well through self‑directed study, there are plenty of excellent online resources:
- Python: https://www.udemy.com/course/100-days-of-code/
- Web development: https://www.theodinproject.com/
- Data science & machine learning: https://www.kaggle.com/
In your view, what is the most significant challenge policing faces in adopting and using technology effectively?
My experience over the past three years shows that policing structures and politics are the antithesis of agile delivery. When combined with limited understanding of technology, delivering at pace becomes difficult.
A good example is the Translation application in the CE. Machine translation has existed since the Cold War. While the technology has evolved significantly, the arrival of language models (e.g., ChatGPT) has led policing to conflate generative‑AI concerns with long‑established machine learning approaches. This has slowed the adoption of proven, safe technologies, and brings political and structural hurdles into almost every delivery plan.
What have been the biggest challenges in rolling out the Capabilities Environment?
There has not been, and there still largely isn’t a nationally agreed process for delivering a non‑commercial product like the CE — certainly not at pace. This has meant going force‑to‑force to demonstrate credibility and value, which has been a long slog, but absolutely worth it. Adoption is now almost nationwide, and we can evidence cost savings, time savings, and investigative benefits.
What are the biggest lessons learned regarding the Capabilities Environment?
As corny as it sounds, the biggest lesson is that being decent and helpful carries a lot of weight. You can be the best techie in the world, but it’s pointless without a mission function. I’ve also learned not to let the ebbs and flows of policing politics and structural changes derail our direction of travel. The team has stood the test of time because it has stayed mission‑focused, stayed helpful, and worked consistently to those two tenets.
What are you proudest of from the last year?
I’m most proud of the team. Working with people who want to be at work, want to help, want to do the right thing, and feel confident pushing innovation has been a privilege — both the directly employed team and the contracted resources we work hand‑in‑glove with.
How do you think the blend of police officers and police staff works in TOEX?
It’s crucial. I’ve seen technical experts who struggle to translate their brilliance into practical policing impact, and I’ve seen policing colleagues who are instinctively technophobic. Having both groups in the same team means the techies can sense‑check ideas against real‑world policing use, and operational staff can better understand what is possible — and ask for the tools that help most.
In the next quarter, we’ll hear from another member from the TOEX team on all things that make them tick.