THE Crown Prosecution Service is costing council taxpayers thousands of pounds every week by causing police officers to prepare files which have to be faxed to the CPS for them to decide whether a detained person should be charged with an offence.
Sometimes this process can last for hours, especially in the evenings or weekends and all the time the detained person is kept in a cell which I am sure is verging on being unlawful.
Police officers, who are becoming rarer and rarer on our streets, should not be bogged down with waiting for the CPS to make a decision.
If they decide to take no further action the detained person and the officer have been delayed for nothing.
It is about time charging decisions were given back to custody sergeants.
COUNCILLOR MIKE REID, Totton.
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