GM YOTS/SOMU PRACTICE GUIDANCE DOCUMENT

The following is good practice guidance relating to partnership working between Greater Manchester Youth Offending Teams/Services (YOTS) and Greater Manchester Police Sex Offender Management Unit (SOMU) and is not taken from YJB 2009 revised National Standards for Youth Justice Services.

The guidance has been drafted in response to a number of issues highlighted following the completion of a serious case review in Trafford and seeks to establish a process that brings YOS/SOMU partnership working on sex offenders in line with the more established arrangements between Greater Manchester Probation Trust and SOMU.

The guidance applies only to registered sex offenders as SOMU remit does not extend to other offenders. However, it is recognised that YOTs also supervise a number of young people convicted of sexual offences and assessed as presenting a risk of further sexually harmful behaviour who are not registered sex offenders. In such cases and where required, the divisional police rather than SOMU should be consulted and involved in risk management planning.

1 Close liaison between YOS case manager and police offender manager from SOMU should commence at the pre sentence stage. Each young person who has committed a sexual offence will be known to SOMU and YOS case managers should contact the relevant police officer determined by the District in which the offender resides (See Appendix 5: SOMU contact details) to ensure there is no additional information held by the police of relevance to the AIM assessment and PSR. Consideration of, and discussion around the need to apply for a Sex Offences Prevention Order (SOPO) at the point of conviction should also take place although such orders will be rare for young people and should be reserved for those assessed as presenting a high/very high risk of further serious sexually harmful offending. Reference to SOPO applications should be made in the PSR, although the responsibility for the civil order is held by the police.

2 Post sentence the YOS case manager should contact the relevant police officer to arrange a joint home visit. This home visit should be conducted within 20 working days of the sentence for offenders serving a community sentence. For those receiving a custodial sentence, the joint home visit should take place within 5 days of release on community licence. The purpose of this joint home visit is to ensure that the young offender and his parent/carer if applicable are aware of their responsibilities and conditions of registration and any additional requirements of their supervision or licence.

3 The outcome of this visit should be recorded on YOIS (Youth offending Information System) and the YOS case manager should pass on any child protection concerns arising from this visit within 24 hours to the local authority children’s services.

4 It is usual practice that for cases under YOS supervision, only an initial and end of supervision home visit will be undertaken by SOMU (unless additional external monitoring is agreed as being required through MAPPA/YOS Case Planning Forum/Equivalent Local Risk Management Panel)

5 All registered sex offenders, regardless of whether they are assessed by YOS as presenting a high risk of harm to others or not should be referred to the YOS Case Planning Forum (or equivalent local risk management panels) within 10 days of sentence. SOMU should be invited to all initial and review CPF’s on registered sex offenders. Discussion at the initial CPF will then determine whether the case requires ongoing contribution from SOMU and whether the case meets the criteria for a Level2/3 MAPPA.

6 YOS CPF (or equivalent local risk management panel) invites to SOMU should be addressed directly to the local relevant police officer but should also be cc’d to the SOMU central mailbox () for monitoring purposes and to ensure that cases are picked up in the event of leave. Non attendance by SOMU officers at CPF’s should be taken up in the first instance with the police officer themselves, subsequent non attendance should be addressed with a SOMU police sergeant.

7 SOMU officers experience and expertise in managing sex offenders should be utilised from the earliest opportunity and SOMU officers should be invited to contribute to initial AIM assessments and should also be invited to attend AIM strategy meetings and reviews.

8 If escalation in risk is identified at any point it is important that SOMU are notified as soon as possible and that YOS case managers do not wait for the next CPF or MAPPA meeting to share information. This will ensure that SOMU are able to take appropriate action, such as increasing the frequency of home visits undertaken. The emphasis is on continuous risk assessment and YOS and SOMU should communicate as frequently as the risk dictates in order that risk assessments and risk management plans are robust and kept up to date.

Tom Dooks

Trafford YOS

9/7/10