CPS shake-up puts attorneys in control

A MAJOR overhaul of the "over-centralised and bureaucratic" Crown Prosecution Service is needed to stop so many cases being dropped before they get to court, an official report concluded yesterday.

The CPS is so badly organised that its top 400 lawyers spend less than one-third of their time on casework and in court, the study also found.

Local United States-style district attorneys are to take control of crime cases in a radical shake-up of the prosecution service.

The proposals for widescale changes follow an 11-month inquiry into the CPS which criticised the organisation for being bogged down by bureaucracy and failing in its principal aim of providing an effective and efficient prosecution system.

Sir Iain Glidewell's report concluded: "Our assessment of the CPS is that it has the potential to become a lively, successful and esteemed part of the criminal justice system, but that, sadly, none of these adjectives applied to the service as a whole at present."

Sir Iain said it was "clearly a matter for concern" that one in eight suspects charged by police later had their cases thrown out by the CPS. The figure rose to 29 per cent in assaults and nearly one-fifth in fraud and forgery cases, but just one in a hundred for motoring offences.

Sir Iain, a former Appeal Court judge, said there "may be some validity" in claims that the CPS tends to "discontinue cases which might be judged as borderline in an effort to ease the pressures on a hard-pressed lawyer".

There was also concern that more than half the cases that fail in court do so because judges, rather than juries, acquit the defendant. This is often due to problems or errors made with evidence and witnesses.

The CPS, established in 1986, needed to switch its attention from dealing with the huge number of relatively minor cases in magistrates' courts to serious crime handled in Crown Courts.

Among the key changes already agreed is the decentralisation of the service into 42 areas, one to match each police force area in England and Wales. Each area will be headed by a new chief crown prosecutor with responsibility for prosecutions. The prosecutors will deal as an equal with chief constables and judges.

The critical tone of the report is widely believed to have prompted Dame Barbara Mills, the Director of Public Prosecutions and head of the CPS, to announce her retirement 11 days ago despite having a year left of her contract.

Although the carefully worded report does not overtly attack Dame Barbara, who took up her job in 1992, it does say that the CPS has become "too centralised and bureaucratic" since 1993.

A successor for the pounds 110,000-a-year job is to be appointed in the autumn. In the meantime, the role has been split and a new post of chief executive, a deputy to look after the managerial and administrative side of the CPS, has been created.

Mark Addison, 47, a Cambridge graduate and career civil servant at the Cabinet Office, was yesterday named as the first holder of the post.

Administrative staff outnumbered lawyers by two to one, and the top 400 of the 2,000 CPS lawyers spent less than one-third of their time on casework and advocacy.

Among the other key proposals are:

A new joint CPS-police "criminal justice units" to take over the prosecution of a case immediately after the police charge the defendant.

An enhanced central casework section to deal with serious cases such as terrorism and police corruption, which has been criticised for being badly run.

The setting up of five or six regional units and a headquarters team to deal with Special Casework, such as serious organised crime, international fraud, and City corruption.

The Attorney-General, John Morris, yesterday welcomed the report which he said "proposes a radical and far-reaching reorganisation of the CPS".

The reaction from lawyers, CPS staff, and the police towards the proposed reforms was generally positive, although there were warnings of the dangers of the service losing its independence from the police.

Leading article, page 20