CPS North East has been engaging well with criminal justice partners, but improvements need to be made to casework, a recent inspection found.

Inspectors found that the Area has a good engagement strategy and demonstrates a high level of commitment which has resulted in some improvements. For example, the positive relationships the Area has built up with Northumbria Police have meant a police officer has been placed in the Rape and Serious Sexual Offences unit to help improve police file quality.

The Area has also been engaging well with community groups on a range of issues, including Victim Support, which has led to an improvement in the quality of letters sent to hate crime victims.

The inspection revealed that the Victim Liaison Unit manages its performance well, but not all prosecutors are clear on when they should be contributing to the letters sent to victims. Work also needs to be done to reduce the number of data security breaches where personal details of victims or witnesses were sent out wrongly.

Financial planning is good and the Area has consistently come within its budget and has underspent the last two years – in 2016-17 it underspent by £74,821.

The Area has good overall conviction rates, above or close to the national average, but the Area’s main performance issues relates to trial effectiveness in both the magistrates’ court and the Crown Court. The effective trial rate in the magistrates’ courts in 2016-17 was only 39.7%, compared with 47.0% nationally. The effective trial rate in Crown Courts was 35.0%, which is far below the national average of 50.7%.
Substantial improvements need to be made with regards to casework, such as ensuring all cases are reviewed properly within the required timescales and improving case progression.

Chief Inspector Kevin McGinty said: “CPS North East has a high level of engagement with local criminal justice partners and community groups which is helping improve the Area’s support to victims.

“However, the quality of its casework was not up to the standard it should be. Much needs to be done to improve both magistrates’ courts and Crown Court casework, before it can be considered of high quality.”

CPS North East has offices at Newcastle and Middlesbrough, and is aligned with Cleveland, Durham and Northumbria police forces. It covers ten magistrates’ courts and three Crown Court centres.

Inspectors examined 120 magistrates’ court and Crown Court files which were finalised between January and March 2017. Fieldwork took place in June 2017 and inspectors spoke to members of the judiciary, representatives of partner agencies, and CPS staff. Court observations also took place during this period.