Cross Border Police Cooperation on the Island of Ireland Post-Brexit

Abstract

The UK withdrawal from the EU has profound consequences for criminal justice and policing. This working paper explores these consequences in the specific context of police cooperation on the island of Ireland. For political, historical, cultural and geographic reasons, police cooperation on the island is simultaneously essential, sensitive and challenging. Here I examine how that police cooperation has operated to date and what the impact of Brexit is likely to be on that cooperation, focusing on mechanisms at risk, potential impacts on criminality and the consequences for crime levels, investigation and detection.

Keywords: Brexit, Police cooperation, Joint Investigation Teams, Schengen Information System, EAW, Human Rights, Policing