LAWBOXPROSECUTION ROUTES
PROSECUTION
If a force will not record, investigate or charge — and the CPS will not pick it up — the criminal law does not vanish. Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 s.6 leaves a residual right. This page is the public map of that door. It is not LAWBOX filing a charge in your name.
Failure to record or investigate is first a complaint (Police Reform Act 2002) and, if the facts are serious, an IOPC matter. It is not automatically a crime. A private prosecution is a last door after the state route is refused or stalled — and only where the elements of an offence are actually made out. Thin or spiteful files get stopped by the DPP or the court.
Police Reform Act 2002 and the Police (Conduct) Regulations. IOPC or Professional Standards. Civil standard. Can end a career. Not a criminal conviction.
IOPC or a force refers a file. The CPS applies the Code for Crown Prosecutors. Independent of the police. This is the ordinary criminal door.
Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 s.6(1) preserves the right of any person to institute proceedings. The DPP may take over or stop them under s.6(2).
Prosecution of Offences Act 1985 s.6(1): nothing in that Part stops any person instituting or conducting criminal proceedings to which the Director’s duty to take over does not apply. s.6(2): the Director may take over at any stage anyway.
Primary text: legislation.gov.uk — POA 1985 s.6. GOV.UK private-prosecution note: any adult may apply to a magistrates’ court; some offences need Attorney General or DPP consent; the CPS can discontinue.
Proceedings usually start in the magistrates’ court (Criminal Procedure Rules Part 7; information / written charge). A private prosecutor is treated as a minister of justice: candour, unused-material duties under the Criminal Procedure and Investigations Act 1996, and abuse-of-process risk if the case is thin or spiteful. Costs can go against the prosecutor.
Common law. Indictable only. Maximum life. CPS: a public officer acting as such; wilful neglect or misconduct; to such a degree as to amount to an abuse of the public’s trust. Police constables, PCSOs, some civilian police staff, local-authority employees and others holding public office can fall in. See Attorney General’s Reference No 3 of 2003; R v Dytham (officer who stood by).
Statutory offence the CPS tells prosecutors to consider alongside MiPO where the suspect is a police officer. Read the charging Act, not a forum post.
Assault, ABH, GBH, sexual offences, theft, fraud, perjury, perverting the course of justice, computer misuse, data-protection offences. The job title does not rewrite the elements. Time limits follow the offence class — see the time-limits desk.
Bribing or being bribed. Applies to public functions. Separate from “a bit of hospitality” folklore.
Council officers, NHS managers exercising public functions, prison staff, civil servants and others can still commit ordinary offences and, where they hold a public office, misconduct in public office. Complaints may also run through the Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman, PHSO, or the body’s own standards code. Those are not prosecutions.
Publish the residual route for when a force or the CPS does not charge. Point at POA 1985 s.6, IOPC and the time-limit table. Log a desk note. Share with #Lawbox.
Lay an information in your name. Appear as prosecutor. Promise a charge. Store ID. Name a living person as a criminal unless an official public finding already does.
Sources: POA 1985 s.6 · GOV.UK private prosecutions · CPS MiPO · CPS criminal allegations against the police · IOPC. Scotland and Northern Ireland are different systems.