Post-sentence investigation and offender management

All court decision files should be thoroughly checked on conviction of an offender to ensure that all offences have been recorded correctly and all offences admitted are marked as detected. This is particularly important for future applications for bad character evidence.

Prison visits

Forces should consider:

• the production of suspects on remand, or prison visits to suspects charged but not yet convicted so that further offences can be identified and taken into consideration
• visiting all offenders who receive a custodial sentence to undertake an offender debrief, to obtain information or intelligence about other offenders, offences, offence method or modus operandi (MO), lifestyle details and methods of property disposal
• periodically re-visiting prisons to debrief prisoners for intelligence purposes
• developing target packages where a non-custodial sentence is imposed following conviction – these will inform a future investigation if the offender is suspected of committing further crimes

Prison releases

Prison liaison officers can provide intelligence on prisoners who are about to be released, including the prisoners’ communications and associations with fellow inmates and prisoners at other establishments.

Force intelligence teams should notify local intelligence units promptly about prisoners who are about to be released on licence and the release of persistent offenders.

Target packages can be developed to manage offenders suspected of committing further crime following release.