GuidanceStatutory guidance

Offensive weapons homicide reviews

Statutory guidance on offensive weapons homicide reviews.

Applies to England and Wales

Documents

Offensive weapons homicide reviews: statutory guidance

This file may not be suitable for users of assistive technology.

Request an accessible format.
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need a version of this document in a more accessible format, please email alternativeformats@homeoffice.gov.uk. Please tell us what format you need. It will help us if you say what assistive technology you use.

Offensive weapons homicide reviews: statutory guidance (print-ready PDF)

This file may not be suitable for users of assistive technology.

Request an accessible format.
If you use assistive technology (such as a screen reader) and need a version of this document in a more accessible format, please email alternativeformats@homeoffice.gov.uk. Please tell us what format you need. It will help us if you say what assistive technology you use.

Details

The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022 introduced a requirement on the police and local authorities in England and Wales and integrated care boards in England and local health boards in Wales, to review the circumstancecircumstances of certain homicides where the victim was aged 18 or over and where the events surrounding their death involved, or were likely to have involved, the use of an offensive weapon.

The purpose of these reviews is to ensure that when a qualifying homicide takes place, local partners identify the lessons to be learnt from the death, consider whether any action should be taken as a result and share the outcome. The intention is that these reviews will improve the national and local understanding of what causes homicide and serious violence, better equipping services to prevent weapons-enabled homicides.

The reviews are being piloted in certain areas of London,London inand the West Midlands and in South Wales.

Published 29 March 2023
Last updated 11 April 2023 + show all updates
  1. Added 'Privacy information notice - piloting of offensive weapons homicide reviews'.

  2. First published.