Rape charging decisions 2021-2022
Request and response
1. How many allegations of rape were passed from the police to the CPS for a charging decision in the year 2021/22 financial year?
The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) publishes rape-flagged data, including the total number of pre-charge referrals and decision outcomes. This information can be accessed on the CPS website, in the downloadable pre-charge tables, via the following links:
https://www.cps.gov.uk/publication/cps-data-summary-quarter-4-2021-2022
https://www.cps.gov.uk/publication/cps-quarterly-data-summaries
2. On how many occasions did the CPS decide to take no further action?
Please refer to our response for question one.
3. When the decision was made to take no further action how many cases were classified as (i) failing to meet the evidential test and (ii) how many was it not in the public interest to proceed?
The CPS does not publish the disaggregated ‘no further action/no prosecution’ decisions based upon evidential or public interest reasons. Please refer to the table below which shows rape flagged pre-charge data for 2021/2022 which should be read in conjunction with the caveats appended to it.
| CPS: RAPE FLAGGED PRE-CHARGE DECISIONS | 2021-2022 |
|---|---|
| No Prosecution - Evidential | 940 |
| No Prosecution - Public Interest | 43 |
| No Prosecution Total | 983 |
| Total Legal Decisions | 3,217 |
| Total Pre-charge Decisions | 4,712 |
Caveats:
The counting unit for CPS pre-charge decision records is the suspect in a case, as opposed to the number of offences, or the number of cases. Thus, if a single set of proceedings involves more than one suspect, then each suspect is counted, and the outcome is recorded for each suspect.
No Prosecution: cases where the decision is not to prosecute for evidential or public interest reasons
Pre-charge legal decisions include: charge, take no further action or recommend an out of court decision.
Charged: Charged decisions are where CPS is satisfied that the legal test for prosecution, set out in the Code for Crown Prosecutors is met: there is enough evidence to provide a ‘realistic prospect of conviction’ against each defendant and the prosecution is in the public interest.
No Further Action (NFA): NFA decisions are where CPS has decided that no further action should be taken; the case cannot proceed to charge as it does not meet the Code for Crown Prosecutor test, for either evidential or public interest reasons.