{"schemaVersion":"1.0","id":"what-they-were-looking-for","dataset":"search-objects","title":"What they were looking for","description":"Drugs, stolen property, weapons: what officers recorded as the object of each search.","methodology":"The object of search recorded for every Metropolitan Police stop and search in the latest six published months, shown as a share of that month's searches. This describes what officers said they were looking for, not what was found. Missing objects remain Not recorded rather than being assigned to another category.","category":"crime","categoryLabel":"Crime","cadence":"monthly","placeholder":false,"landingPage":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for","markdown":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for/index.html.md","source":{"name":"Police.uk","url":"https://data.police.uk/","licence":"Open Government Licence v3.0","licenceUrl":"https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/"},"updatedAt":"2026-07-31T15:43:42.858Z","release":{"label":null,"publishedAt":null,"resourceUrl":null,"methodologyUrl":null,"sha256":null},"observations":[{"series":"Anything to threaten or harm anyone","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[0.11,0.16,0.89,0.85],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Articles for use in criminal damage","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[0.58,0.38,0.56,0.47],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Controlled drugs","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[60.71,58.92,58.01,57.47],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Evidence of offences under the Act","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[3.93,3.55,3.59,3.75],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Firearms","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[0.52,0.26,0.37,0.47],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Fireworks","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[0.23,0.09,0.06,0.23],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Not recorded","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[0.21,0.27,0.23,0.39],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Offensive weapons","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[12.33,13.96,15.68,16.18],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]},{"series":"Stolen goods","buckets":["2026-01","2026-02","2026-04","2026-05"],"values":[21.38,22.4,20.62,20.18],"unit":"% of searches","metadata":[{},{},{},{}]}],"areaStatistics":null,"visualizations":[{"id":"overview","label":"Objects","description":"What officers recorded as the object of each search.","url":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for","renderer":"primary","default":true,"timeControl":"inherit","datasets":[],"transform":null,"controls":null,"metrics":[],"caveat":null},{"id":"share","label":"Share over time","description":"How the recorded object mix changed across published months.","url":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for?view=share","renderer":"share-trend","default":false,"timeControl":"inherit","datasets":[],"transform":"share-of-period","controls":null,"metrics":[],"caveat":null},{"id":"first-last","label":"First to latest","description":"Compare every recorded object in the first and latest available month.","url":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for?view=first-last","renderer":"slope","default":false,"timeControl":"inherit","datasets":[],"transform":"first-to-latest","controls":null,"metrics":[],"caveat":null},{"id":"object-outcome","label":"Object × outcome","description":"Count the jointly recorded object and outcome for the latest month.","url":"https://londongraph.com/g/what-they-were-looking-for?view=object-outcome","renderer":"matrix","default":false,"timeControl":"inherit","datasets":["search-object-outcome"],"transform":"object-outcome-matrix","controls":null,"metrics":[],"caveat":"Cells with fewer than ten searches are suppressed before publication."}],"availability":"observations","note":"The release is complete for the measures represented on the graph page."}