Our Promise to You

We will:

• Ensure that victims can refer to the Victims and Witness service via website, telephone, email, and letter or through Northumbria Police and other third parties.
• Provide a flexible service to all victims whatever their race, gender, disability, sexuality, culture, religion or age.
• Ensure that all of our staff and volunteers are fully trained and have passed strict vetting procedures.
• Protect your personal data.
• Focus on your personal safety and welfare.
• We will clearly explain the boundaries of confidentially and safeguarding.
• Victim and Witness Support Officers will be polite, helpful and professional, ensuring your are treated fairly.
• Ensure that enquiries are dealt with promptly and efficiently.

To help us achieve our standards, we ask that you:

• Provide information to allow the Victim and Witness Support Officer to offer you the best support.
• Let us know if you need any specialist support to access the service.
• Agree a future contract agreement.

We will:

• Allocate you a dedicated Victim and Witness Support Officer who will support you on you recovery journey.
• Ensure that Victim and Witness Support Officers will make contact within 48 hours of referral to the service.
• Discuss an individual needs assessment based on your current circumstances.
• Empower you to help design your cope and recovery plan.
• Carry out a risk assessment of your needs to identify areas of vulnerability and take appropriate action.
• Refer to specialist support services in a timely manner that meets your cope and recovery needs.
• Where appropriate, offer you dedicated support from trained volunteers.
• Identify any gaps in specialist support services.
• Where appropriate refer you back to you Victim and Witness Support Officer for support after a court outcome.

We will:

• Discuss Restorative Justice options with all appropriate victims of crime where court proceedings have commenced.
• Ensure victims are informed and supported before, during and after the Restorative Justice intervention.
• Offer direct and indirect Restorative Justice interventions and options for all corporate victims.
• Assess your satisfaction levels after a Restorative Justice intervention and use feedback to inform future Restorative Justice interventions and support.

We will:

• Complete victim satisfaction surveys and use the results to inform development of future victim services.
• Hear directly from the victims and witnesses about their experiences through focus groups and surveys, directly feeding your views back to the criminal justice services.
• Look at the specialist support that is in place locally and increase victim accessibility to this support.
• Set out what needs to be done locally to enable better support for victims of crime and ensure that this is reflected in area wide strategies.
• Provide clear information to allow you to raise a concern or make a complaint about the service you have received and keep you informed of the progress of your complaint.