Britain’s justice system is on red alert. Today the Met Commissioner criticised the Crown Prosecution Service, accusing it of failing victims of crime by “cherry-picking” cases to artificially enhance conviction rates.
Sir Mark Rowley told the Evening Standard about his view that prosecutors “are not taking on the harder cases”. The data appears to back him up. Figures from the Ministry of Justice show that prosecutions in England and Wales in the 12 months to the end of September last year were down 16 per cent on the comparable pre-Covid figure, despite a 14 per cent rise in recorded crime.
