What is Community Engagement?

Community Engagement is the term we use which covers all aspects of how we interact with the public.

It also includes our:

  • Local Scrutiny  and Involvement Panel
  • Community Involvement Panels

Hate crime and crimes against older people report 2009-2010

Click here to download the report

Anti-Social Behaviour

Anti-social behaviour is behaviour that causes, or is likely to cause, harassment, alarm or distress to a person not of the same household.

Acts of anti-social behaviour, such as vandalism, graffiti or harassment, may seem comparatively minor crimes. However, these can have a very damaging effect on the community in which it takes place. Where anti-social behaviour is targeted at individuals, or a specific group within a community, the effects can be devastating, causing residents to live in fear and destroying people's quality of life.  

The CPS works closely with the police, local authorities and the courts to tackle all forms of antisocial behaviour. Kinds of behaviour may include drugs, begging, street crime, misbehaviour by youths and general disorder. Our part in tackling anti-social behaviour is to identify when criminal offences have been committed and to prosecute them in the courts, making sure we inform the courts of the impact the offences have on individuals.

Some anti-social behaviour is a criminal offence (for example, graffiti is criminal damage).  Where appropriate, we will apply for Anti-social behaviour orders (ASBO's) to be made on conviction. We will support other agencies in the enforcement of any breaches of these orders.

Contact us

If you would like to contact the West Midlands group Equality, Diversity and Community Engagement Manager, then please email Parveen.Hassan@cps.gsi.gov.uk

Please note that this email address is for information about the work of the CPS only.

We do not provide legal advice.

We cannot enter into email correspondence about individual cases.  Such requests will not be responded to.

If you have feedback or a complaint, please use the link on the left.

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Home » Us and the Community

Us and the Community

Parveen HassanWe understand that people sometimes don't know what the CPS is or what we do.

We wish to change this in order to meet our Core Quality Standard 12 - we will engage with communities so that we are aware of their concerns when we make decisions.

CPS West Midlands is committed to raising our profile and improving public confidence in the Criminal Justice System.

Parveen Hassan, pictured, is the Equality, Diversity and Community Engagement Manager. She is responsible for overseeing Community Engagement Assessments, Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panels Hate Crime Scrutiny
She monitors the strategic performance on equality, diversity and community engagement across the Area and puts in place strategies to improve Public Confidence amongst the communities we serve.

Our aim is to inform, listen to, work with and be informed by those living in the area.

Establishing and developing positive relationships with the public in whose interests we act in is a fundamental aspect of the work we do.

The CPS does a major aspect of Community Engagement through the establishment of the Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panels.

Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panel

The Sectors are currently working to develop the Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panels dealing with Violence Against Women cases and Hate Crimes.

Community and Voluntary Sector are crucial in building public confidence and participate to the review our casework through these panels. This enables public scrutiny and accountability on CPS finalised cases to highlight and improve our casework for internal changes in practice and processes.

The CPS trains panel members to engage on the case work and decisions we undertake to ensure our policies are applied. This includes security checks for quality assurance, information on differing policies supporting victims and witnesses. These are supported and chaired by the Senior Sector Crown Prosecutor in some Sectors with local champions.

CPS West Midlands has established a number of Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panels, across the strands of Domestic Violence and Hate Crimes. These were established since 2007 and have been revised with Area Structures the CPS has recently taken.

Nominated community representatives with specialist knowledge of such crimes. These panels are made up of local people with experience of supporting Violence Against Women victims and hate crime victims, who look closely at past prosecutions to see if anything about them could have been done better.

The aims, purpose and objectives of these panels are to bring community members together to raise awareness and understanding of how and why CPS decisions are made.

Conversely, the panels might identify ways in which the prosecution decision process could be improved. It was intended that the panel would be regarded as a 'critical friend' and, that good practice, training issues and lessons learnt would be shared.

With improved community confidence, more victims and witnesses of such crimes would come forward.

Feedback from the panels can be positive or negative, and recommendations are used by CPS prosecutors to inform the way they deal with future cases.

As a direct result of the Central Sector Local Scrutiny and Involvement Panel (Domestic Violence), a protocol document has been developed in conjunction with West Midlands Police.

If any member of the community wishes to learn more from the panel please contact Parveen Hassan via email on parveen.hassan@cps.gsi.gov.uk

Find out more about crimes against older people.

CPS Romany Gypsy, Traveller Prosecution Guidance Prosecution Launch 23rd November 2011

The CPS hosted the launch with community organisations from the Traveller, Romany and Gypsy communities including the President of the Gypsy Traveller Council Education Culture, Welfare and Civil Rights, European Romany Union

The aim of the event was to;

  • Launch of the CPS Guidance on responses to Hate Crime in Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Communities;
  • Explore the customs and traditions of the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller Communities;
  • Consider the challenges ahead  and look at ways of providing confidence in the Criminal Justice System to report hate crime

A report of the findings will be available on request.