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© Copyright, Victims Commissioner 2025.

Justice delayed: The impact of the Crown Court backlog on victims, victim services and the criminal justice system

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OVC Crown Court backlog report 04.03.25 (PDF, 1.3 MB)

This report comes at a time of unprecedented delays in the Crown Court, with the number of outstanding cases currently at a record high. With this primary research, the Commissioner highlights the impact of delays in the Crown Court on victims, victim services staff and the criminal justice system across England and Wales.

The report identifies the devastating impacts of the Crown Court backlog on victims’ wellbeing and their lives, often preventing them from recovering and moving on from the trauma they have experienced. Their experiences of repeated delays lead to low confidence and disengagement from the process, which damages the effectiveness of the criminal justice system. This is further exacerbated by the detrimental impact that long waiting times have on the evidence quality of victims and witnesses.

The report also highlights how despite leading to increased demand for support and increased support needs, the delays impede the ability of victim services to provide this support. This is due to unsustainable caseloads across services, leading to concerns about quality of support provision and increased risk of victim services staff burnout.

  • 249 victims of crime from across England and Wales where the Crown Prosecution Service had charged the perpetrator completed a survey about their experiences of navigating the Crown Court process amidst the delays. Twelve of these respondents participated in follow-up interviews.
  • 244 staff from victim services organisations across England and Wales completed a survey about their experiences of the Crown Court delays and their impact on their services, the victims they are supporting, their organisation and the wider criminal justice system.
  • The report makes recommendations aimed at improving the victim experience of the criminal justice system, increasing the transparency and efficiency of court processes and ensuring victim services can provide support to victims as they wait for the case to get to trial. Please note that there have been some small changes to recommendations 2 and 12, following circulation of our embargoed copy of the report. These changes do not substantially change the recommendations.