Criminal Justice update

Report: 21
Date: 12 February 2004
By: Commissioner

Summary

This report provides an update on the work being carried out by the Department of Criminal Justice with the ultimate aim of bringing more offences to justice.

A. Recommendations

That the report be noted.

B. Supporting information

Justice for London

1. The Justice for London Model has now been introduced at Lambeth and Southwark, Newham, Brent, Hackney, Lewisham, Waltham Forest and Croydon. The Justice for London Model will be introduced to the remaining ‘Safer Street’ boroughs by March 2004.

Victim and Witness Care

2. Feedback from witnesses concerning Victim and Witness Support Units continues to be extremely positive. At Lambeth and Southwark this is reflected in a month on month decrease in the number of cracked trials due to private witness non-attendance from September through to December.

3. In January we embarked on the accelerated rollout with implementation taking place at a number of boroughs simultaneously and training at a central location. This has started with Ealing and Wandsworth and will be followed by Haringey and Tower Hamlets. This should result in the rollout being completed by Summer 2004.

CPS Lawyers at the point of charge

4. The rollout of Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) lawyers to the point of charge continues and the latest rollout schedule is attached for information at Appendix 1. All the safer street boroughs had access to a lawyer by the 31 December 2003. The other boroughs are on schedule to go live by the 31 March 2004.

5. There has been an improvement in the lawyer situation with the CPS taking on a number of qualified lawyers. There is a timetable for the migration of all London boroughs to the statutory scheme during 2004.

CPS Direct

6. In London, CPS Direct is being piloted in Southwark and Lambeth; this approach provides access to CPS lawyers for charging decisions outside of normal hours. Since the last report this approach has matured resulting in an improved uptake. From commencement to 31 December there were 748 referrals resulting in written advice.

7. From the 1 to the 19 January 2004 there were 199 cases referred resulting in written advice.

National Strategy for Police Information Systems (NSPIS) Custody and Case Preparation

8. Work continues to implement NSPIS Case Preparation at the chosen pilot site (Newham). Initial readiness checks have been completed for the operational and training technical environments and work is progressing with regard to various interface and configuration activities and to finalising support and security arrangements.

9. The training requirements are being finalised, in order that courses can be developed. A local implementation team has been set up at Newham to work with the project team dealing with implementation. Target date to commence operational use of the application at Newham is March 2004.

10. Work has started on scooping NSPIS Custody application and familiarisation, to identify the business issues to be addressed. The application will also be piloted at Newham. An exact date for the pilot is to be agreed, but will be in operational use before the end of June 2004.

Performance

Discontinued cases

11. Magistrates Court - There has been a 17.5% reduction in the number of discontinued cases compared with 2002/03. This equates to 3,564 cases.

12. Crown Court - There has been an 18.6% reduction in the number of discontinued cases compared with 2002/03. This equates to 672 cases.

Discharge Committals

13. There has been a 45% reduction in the number of discharge committals, during the period April-03 (160) to Oct-03 (88).

Cracked and ineffective trials

14. The London Criminal Justice Board (LCJB) target for 2003/04 is to reduce the number of cracked and ineffective trials through prosecution failures to 10%. The current figure stands at 24.3% for Magistrates Courts and 22% Crown Courts, an improvement of approx 2% and 4% for Magistrates and Crown Courts respectively. The ineffective trials the figure stands at 12.4%. This is a cross agency target involving the police, CPS and courts.

Persistent Young Offenders (PYO)

15. The PYO target relates the timeliness through the criminal justice system from arrest to sentencing. The target is that this should be achieved in 71 days or less. This is a cross agency target involving the police, CPS and Courts.

16. Success against the target depends on the combined effort of the police, CPS and the Courts and remains elusive in London. In both February and June 2003 initial figures suggested that it had been reached but once adjusted by PA Consulting the figure went above the 71-day mark.

17. The table below shows, the improvement the MPS has made from January 2000 to October 2003. During October 03 an average of 61% of London’s PYO cases were completed within 71 days.

Chart 1: Arrest to sentence - Oct 03 (see supporting material)

Warrants

18. The introduction of the new grading system for warrants has resulted in an emphasis on tackling warrants relating to the following areas:

• Serious arrestable offences – as defined by Section 116(2) PACE
• MPS defined prominent and development nominals
• Persistent offenders as defined in the Government’s Narrowing the Justice Gap initiative
• MPS defined hate crime
• Warrants relating to burglary, street crime or registered sex offenders

19. This approach has been successful in reducing the number of Grade A warrants by 37% to date.

20. There has been a 3% percentage reduction in the number of outstanding warrants since the beginning of the performance year. There are 15,326 circulate warrants as at 1st January 2004.

London Criminal Justice Board

21. The London Criminal Justice Board was held on 15 January 2004. An update was given to the board by the Chair of the victim and witness sub-group. In particular note was made by the board on the MPS led project providing an information wallet to victims and witnesses. The board allocated £10K funding to extend this approach.

22. A performance update was presented to the board dealing with the issues reported elsewhere in this report.

23. The board agreed to a review of the street crime protocol, by the persistent offender sub-group.

24. It was agreed that the board would take part in a proposal for a second ‘Urban Justice’ conference following on from the successful event in 2003.

25. A presentation was provided to the board by two borough criminal justice groups of local performance issues.

Local Borough Criminal Justice Groups

26. When the Department of Criminal Justice was set up, the MPS suggested that the board use the then Court User Groups as the vehicle for local delivery. These groups were to reflect the make up of the strategic board and to be responsible and accountable for local delivery.

27. The approach was agreed and these boards are now operating on each borough, chaired by a lead officer on rotation from each of the agencies. Where the police have the chair, the Borough Commander normally undertakes the role.

28. At the monthly London Board the chairs from two of the borough groups are invited to present to the board on local performance together with issues upon which the board may assist.

Centralised Traffic Unit

29. The work to centralise the traffic process function is continuing as part of the Transport for London (TfL) portfolio. The arrangements to ensure the previously agreed rollout programme (see the December update report) will be on target are progressing on schedule.

Penalty Notices for Disorder

30. The Penalty Notice for Disorder (PND) offences began its roll out across the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) on 1 December 2003. The Anti Social Behaviour Act 2003 additionally includes and extends the PND scheme to include 16 and 17-year-old offenders. Although the commencement date for this is January 2004 it will be tested as a proof of concept before a London wide roll out.

31. As an existing PND pilot site the MPS were invited to attend a National Project Group meeting to agree with other Criminal Justice Partners, who are already familiar with the practical demands of the PND scheme, a criteria for hosting pilots for youth offenders. The pilot will run for a period of 12 months from early February 2004 at Kingston and Tower Hamlets Boroughs.

32. Operation Emerald is taking the lead with close co-operation and support from the MPS Youth Justice Policy.

Bail granted elsewhere than at a police station (‘street bail’)

33. From 20 January 2004, an amendment to PACE empowers arresting officers to release suspects on bail to attend a police station at a later time. This offers an opportunity to better manage the demand on custody facilities. ‘Street bail’ is a totally new concept for police and in the absence of a statutory enabled pilot; it has not been possible to determine its impact with any degree of certainty.

34. By far the most important aspect identified is the need for Boroughs to have robust systems to supervise, manage and monitor the use of street bail and its effect on custody facilities. It is proposed to collate and disseminate best practice to help develop and improve procedures and to resolve problems which arise.

C. Equality and diversity implications

This is an update report and therefore there are no new equality or diversity implications at this time.

D. Financial implications

There are no financial implications contained in this paper.

E. Background papers

None.

F. Contact details

Report author: Chief Superintendent Heath, MPS.

For more information contact:

MPA general: 020 7202 0202
Media enquiries: 020 7202 0217/18

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