Senior Crown Prosecutor
Crown Prosecution Service
Apply before 11:55 pm on Sunday 9th February 2025
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About the job
Job summary
As a senior crown prosecutor at the Crown Prosecution Service, you work on some of the most complex and challenging cases – from fraud and firearms offences to public order and corporate manslaughter.
Senior crown prosecutors are highly trained, experienced lawyers with excellent people skills and a passion for delivering justice. This role is largely office-based. You’re responsible for reviewing evidence and making decisions on whether a case should be prosecuted – in line with our Code for Crown Prosecutors. You’re based in one of three units – magistrates’ court, Crown Court or rape and serious sexual offences – depending on your experience level.
You represent the Crown Prosecution Service on the frontline, collaborating closely with colleagues and other criminal justice agencies, including the police and judiciary. You play a vital role in maintaining public confidence in our work.
You benefit from a structured induction four-month training plan and opportunities to shadow colleagues across the organisation. Once you gain further experience, you have options to progress into legal manager and crown advocate roles.
Find out what our senior crown prosecutors say about working at the Crown Prosecution Service by visiting cps.gov.uk/careers/prosecutor.
Job description
Your roles and responsibilities:
- To advise police and other investigators on casework and evidence requirements for a wide range of offences
- To review case files and charging decisions, providing legal advice and making the final decision, based on evidence, on whether prosecutions should proceed on cases for the magistrates’ and Crown Court
- To undertake advocacy in relation to serious and sensitive cases in the magistrates’ courts including Youth Courts, not guilty anticipated plea court lists, and multi-day trials
- To explain our decisions clearly to stakeholders including magistrates, counsel, victims, witnesses and the police
- To work effectively as part of a multi-skilled team and maintain up-to-date knowledge of criminal offences
The prosecution teams:
Each Crown Prosecution Service area has a Crown Court, magistrates’ court, and a rape and serious sexual offences (RASSO) team. As a senior crown prosecutor, you’re expected to be able to work in any of these teams although we do take into account your experience and, where possible, your personal preference before placing you in a team. Whichever team you join, you’re supported with a detailed training and induction plan to cover your first four months with the Crown Prosecution Service.
Working in our Crown Court team, you have a personal caseload of serious casework. You give charging advice to the police on cases to be heard in the Crown Court, working with our paralegal officers and with counsel to prepare cases for court.
In our magistrates’ court team, you are an advocate dealing with the full range of courts including trial courts. You have a personal caseload, giving pre-charge advice to the police on magistrates’ court cases and you prepare cases for court. You may work on a specialist team such as a domestic abuse or youth team.
In our RASSO team, you have a personal caseload comprising rape and serious sexual offences. You give charging and early indicative advice to the police on RASSO cases, working with our paralegal staff and counsel to prepare cases for court.
A more detailed job description document is attached to this advert.
Person specification
- You must be a qualified practising lawyer with criminal law experience
- You must demonstrate your commitment to public service, making a difference to the communities we serve and our CPS values
- You’re focused on personal development and career progression
Qualifications
Academic: You must have a law degree, Common Professional Examination and/or Graduate Diploma in Law.
Professional: You must have completed a Legal Practice Course, Solicitors Qualifying Exam or Bar Professional Training Course and the relevant pupillage and training contract – or have received full exemption from the relevant professional regulatory body, either the Solicitors Regulation Authority or the Bar Standards Board.
or
CILEx: You must be a Fellow of CILEx and a CILEx Advocate/Litigator holding all three advocacy certificates providing you with a ‘general qualification’ within the meaning of s.71 (3) (c) Courts and Legal Services Act 1990. You must have a right of audience in relation to any class of proceedings in any part of the Senior Courts, or all proceedings in county courts or magistrates' courts in order to meet the requirements for a Crown Prosecutor specified by section 1 Prosecution of Offences Act 1985. If you don’t hold this CILEx qualification, you’re not eligible to apply for this vacancy. If you’re unsure whether you have qualified through CILEx, contact us to establish your eligibility for this role.
If you apply and are found not to possess any of the above, any offer of employment will be withdrawn, or contract terminated.
Equivalent qualifications won’t be accepted. If you’re unsure about your eligibility please contact NationalLawyerRecruitment@cps.gov.uk
The eligibility criteria must be met by Monday 17 March 2025. If you’re able to obtain a valid Practising Certificate and will be fully qualified by this date, you’re eligible to apply.
Should there be any restrictions or special arrangements regarding your Practising certificate, we would ask you to inform us at the earliest opportunity, via email.
Behaviours
We'll assess you against these behaviours during the selection process:
- Making Effective Decisions
- Communicating and Influencing
Technical skills
We'll assess you against these technical skills during the selection process:
- You must have a law degree, Common Professional Examination and/or Graduate Diploma in law.
- You must have completed a Legal Practice Course, Solicitors Qualifying Exam or Bar Vocational Course/Bar Professional Training Course and the relevant pupillage or training contract.
- You must be a qualified barrister or solicitor.
- You must demonstrate motivation.
- You must demonstrate sufficient legal intellect
Benefits
We want to ensure our employees can thrive at work and home, and offer a range of support to achieve a balance. This includes flexibility of working hours, flexibility to support caring responsibilities and a flexible approach to deployment. Our hybrid working policy requires you to spend at least 40% of your contracted hours over a four-week period at court, in an office or another official workplace depending on business need and the kind of work you're doing.
Delivering justice is a complex pursuit with work that is sometimes emotionally challenging, which is why we offer a range of benefits including:
- a Civil Service contributory pension of up to 28.9%
- 25 days’ leave, increasing to 30 days after 5 years
- an extra privilege day to mark the King's birthday
- competitive maternity, paternity and parental leave
- flexible working and a family-friendly approach to work
- a Cycle2Work scheme, employee savings
- a range of learning and development activities, an individual learning account, and central and local development opportunities.
Things you need to know
Selection process details
Application
CV
Please upload an up-to-date CV which should include:
- three years' employment and academic history
- skills and experience
- achievements
- qualifications
Your CV will not be marked, however it will be used for eligibility requirements and provides the panel with an insight into your work history and experience at assessment and interview. Please keep it to two A4 pages and don’t provide any personal details that could identify you such as your name, age or home address.
You need to provide the specified application information in the requested format to ensure you’re considered for the post.
If you can’t provide three years’ employment or academic history, you need a character reference for clearance purposes.
Personal data
In line with GDPR, don’t send us any information that can identify children, or any of your own sensitive personal data such as racial or ethnic origin, political opinions, religious or philosophical beliefs, trade union membership, data concerning health or sex life and sexual orientation, genetic or biometric data in your CV and application documentation.
Assessment and interview – from w/c Monday 3 March 2025 to Friday 14 March
If you meet the eligibility criteria, you’re invited to a Microsoft Teams meeting where you complete a legal assessment followed by a short interview. You are assessed and interviewed by a panel of Crown Prosecution Service colleagues to assess your suitability.
Assessed at legal assessment and interview
Ability: Legal Intellect - assessed at legal assessment
Motivation - assessed at interview
Behaviours- we use behaviours to help us understand your experience, to help you do a great job in this role. Crown prosecutor candidates are assessed against level 4 in the Civil Service success profiles behaviours framework. We are assessing two behaviours.
- Making effective decisions (lead behaviour) - assessment and interview
- Communicating and influencing- assessment
Please be aware - you are responsible for booking your own interview and assessment slot through Civil Service Jobs. Once you’ve selected your preferred time slot, we send you a Microsoft Teams link.
These dates may be subject to change and it’s not always possible to offer alternative dates.
Diversity at the Crown Prosecution Service is about inclusion, embracing differences and ensuring our workforce truly reflects the communities we serve. We want you to feel that you belong and can thrive, whatever your background, identity or culture. As a Disability Confident employer, we're happy to support requests for reasonable adjustments and improve your recruitment experience. If you'd like any reasonable adjustments made to our recruitment process, let us know within your application or contact nationallawyerrecruitment@cps.gov.uk
Making offers - from Monday 17 March
You can choose three office location preferences from the list provided. If you’re successful, we aim to offer one of your choices in the first instance. Whilst every effort is made to accommodate your location preferences, the Crown Prosecution Service is a national organisation with differences in operational recovery, vacancy levels and caseloads around the country – which means you may be offered a role in another Crown Prosecution Service area outside your stated preference.
If you’re invited to interview, you are assessed and interviewed by an appropriate panel and offers are made in merit order.
Please note that the lead behaviour at interview stage is making effective decisions. We may use this to determine merit order where candidates have the same overall score.
Candidates who may not be appointable to a senior crown prosecutor (grade 7) role, may be offered a crown prosecutor (senior executive officer grade) role.
Other
This is a full-time post. However, requests for flexible, part-time working and job share are considered – bearing in mind the operational needs of the business. This role is a mixture of home working, office working and travelling to courts. How this is split depends upon the business needs.
You must consider if the commute from your home to the office is a feasible distance to travel before making an application. If you are successful, this is discussed before you take up the post.
The Crown Prosecution Service is based in England and Wales. If you’re applying for this role and live in Scotland or Northern Ireland, you must let us know when accepting this offer as you need permission to work from your home address if hybrid working is part of your role. Unfortunately, there is no guarantee of granting this approval.
The job you are applying for is covered by Article 3(a) of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975, consequently Section 4(2) of that Act does not apply. For the reasons outlined you are required to disclose all previous convictions and cautions, including spent convictions. Failure to make a full declaration results in the withdrawal of an offer of employment if our checks reveal convictions that have not been disclosed.
Reserve list
If all the posts are filled for your preferred locations, you’re put on a reserve list. You may be approached about an opportunity at a location outside your initial preference. Offers are always made in merit order.
There may be instances where you’re offered the opportunity to work on our central prosecution team – to complete work remotely for business areas around England and Wales. If offered, this is for a minimum 12-month period with the possibility of an extension up to 24 months. Once completed, you return on a permanent basis to your Crown Prosecution Service area.
The reserve list expires 12 months after the interviews take place and positions for your first preference can’t be guaranteed.
Timeline
Dates advertised are subject to change and it may not be possible to accommodate alternative requests for interviews and assessment.
Meet and engage sessions
We’re holding an online question and answer session whilst the vacancy is live. This is your chance to ask any questions about the role or the recruitment process. You can register for this now.
- Thursday 23 January, 1-1.45pm - https://meetandengage.com/am5qyoh32
Fair Processing Notice
The Crown Prosecution Service provides a Fair Processing Notice to all new applicants after they’ve been successful at interview. These candidates are informed that, as one aspect of pre-employment screening, their personal details – name, National Insurance number and date of birth – are checked against the Internal Fraud Database. Anyone included on the database is refused employment unless they can demonstrate exceptional circumstances.
The Crown Prosecution Service, on behalf of the vacancy holder, informs applicants when they are refused employment because they’re included in the Internal Fraud Database.
Civil Service Commission
If you’re dissatisfied with the recruitment process and wish to make a complaint, please contact strategic.resourcing@cps.gov.uk with your concerns.
If you remain dissatisfied and wish to make a further complaint, you can do that through the Civil Service Commission complaints page.
Here are our Civil Service Commission recruitment principles.
Feedback will only be provided if you attend an interview or assessment.
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Working for the Civil Service
We recruit by merit on the basis of fair and open competition, as outlined in the Civil Service Commission's recruitment principles (opens in a new window).
Diversity and Inclusion
Apply and further information
Contact point for applicants
Job contact :
- Name : National Lawyer Recruitment Team
- Email : NationalLawyerRecruitment@cps.gov.uk
Recruitment team
- Email : strategic.resourcing@cps.gov.uk
