Prolific and Priority Offenders
It is estimated that approximately 10% of the active offender population are responsible for half of all crime and that a very small proportion of offenders are responsible for one in ten offences. The Prolific and other Priority Offender (PPO) strategy was announced by the Prime Minister in 2004 to provide end-to-end management of this group of offenders.
The Home Office Prolific and Priority Offender Strategy has three complementary Strands:
- The Prevent and Deter Strand which identifies the children and young persons most at risk of becoming involved in criminality. Appropriately targeted youth justice and community based interventions designed to tackle the risk factors which may drive their offending behaviour are used to prevent them from becoming prolific and priority offenders.
- The Catch and Convict Strand of the PPO Strategy identifies the most prolific offenders through multi-agency and community intelligence, with particular focus on those that impact on both national and local priorities, ensuring that robust, proactive and expeditious investigations are conducted from outset to conviction.
- The Rehabilitate and Resettle Strand works with offenders who are both in custody or serving sentences in the community to ensure that they are integrated back into communities and have access to accommodation, education, training, employment, drugs or alcohol dependency services; financial difficulties are assessed and managed in order to reduce risks of re-offending.
As a Partnership we meet on a monthly basis to formally review individual cases across the 3 strands to determine the actions and activities that each agency needs to undertake.
For further information see the Crime Reduction website (external link).