Attorney-General written question – answered at on 5 September 2011.
To ask the Attorney-General on what dates the Director of Public Prosecutions has discussed possible prosecutions of police officers or journalists with (a) other staff of the Crown Prosecution Service, (b) Ministers, (c) the Metropolitan Police and (d) other interested parties since 2003.
There are regular and frequent meetings and discussions between the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) staff, police and Ministers on a range of issues. Case-related meetings are not recorded in a way that allows the interrogation of the central records to identify the defendant's occupation. Cases might also be discussed as part of meetings on other topics.
The CPS's case management system records cases under defendants' names. It does not specifically identify the occupation of defendants. While the CPS's special crime division deals with serious cases, including those involving police officers as defendants, cases involving more minor allegations against police officers may be dealt with by any of the CPS's area offices throughout England and Wales. Cases involving journalists could also be dealt with by any of the area offices. Defendants' occupations could be identified in every case only by examining individual case files.
The CPS, like all Government Departments, operates a carefully controlled policy under the Public Records Acts, which ensures that paperwork is retained for as long as is necessary, but no longer. Since 2003, some of the case files relating to police officers or journalists as defendants will therefore have been destroyed in accordance with their departmental policy in relation to the retention and destruction of files.
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