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Solicitor-General

Answer

Vera Baird: To ask the Solicitor-General what advice the CPS gives to police about charging parents or carers in whose care children have been killed or non- accidentally injured if it is unclear which of them was responsible for the injury or death. [97111] The Solicitor-General: Cases involving death or serious injury to young children, where it is not possible to say which of two parents or carers was responsible for the injury, present particular difficulties for the prosecution. In these cases the Crown Prosecution Service recognises the importance of early involvement with the police and in most cases would seek to advise the police pre-charge. In advising the police, the Crown Prosecution Service will apply the Code for Crown Prosecutors. Before advice is given to proceed with a particular charge, the prosecutor must be satisfied that the evidence provides a realistic prospect of conviction and that it is in the public interest to proceed. Where two carers have been suspects the available evidence often does not go far enough to establish that they acted in concert, `joint enterprise' or that one rather than the other inflicted the injury. If this cannot be established and there is nothing further to show that a parent foresaw a risk of injury to the child that might result in death and failed to take steps to protect the child, then neither parent or carer can be convicted of murder or manslaughter, although in some circumstances a conviction for cruelty or neglect to a child (section 1 of the Children's and Young Persons Act 1933) might follow.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

97111; 403 c457W

Session

2002-03

Subjects

Children Abuse Carers Parents Police

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk