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Police oversight agencies are watchdog bodies for citizens and societies, designed to ensure that the police are operating with integrity and accountability. However, performance indicators for such agencies are hard to find, meaning that evaluation and reflection over trial and errors within the police force are difficult to learn from. Or, in other words, it is challenging to learn through and from unwanted police practice without more predictable indicators for correct performance in these practices. Our contribution is to organise potential indicators within the framework of a model that captures the complaints handling process in police oversight bodies. We suggest five performance indicators: quality and quantity of complaints received, complaints completion process and time, conviction rate from complaints charges, learning and advice for police agencies and confidence in the police oversight agency. These five performance indicators would provide the necessary focus for improving performance as a result of evaluations and creating new knowledge. The case of the Norwegian Bureau for the Investigation of Police Affairs is introduced to apply the model to an evaluation of the Bureau.
Filstad et al. (2011) studied this question.