By
James Slack, Home Affairs Editor
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Theresa May has asked the College of Policing to draw up new guidelines on dealing with crime suspects
Police were last night ordered to halt their march towards arresting and charging suspects in secret.
Theresa May intervened to ‘protect transparency in the criminal justice system’.
It follows revelations by the Mail that one force in three is refusing to name suspects even after they have been charged.
Mrs May fears that if a person’s identity is kept hidden ‘witnesses and other victims might not come forward’.
The Home Secretary is warning chief constables that there ‘should be no right to anonymity at charge apart from in extremely unusual circumstances’.
Where suspects have been arrested but not charged, she said, they could be named if it was in the ‘public interest’ – a broad definition that does not tie police hands.
Forces have been justifying the new policy by quoting the Leveson report on Press standards.
Lord Justice Leveson said that, save in exceptional circumstances, ‘the names or identifying details or those who are arrested or suspected of a crime should not be released to the press or public’.
But in a letter to police policy chiefs, Mrs May pointed out that while the comments had been included in Lord Leveson’s report, they did not form part of his ‘substantive recommendations’.
She added: ‘I would like police forces to be aware of this fact.’
In the wake of the Leveson report, senior police began drawing up their own national guidelines stating that suspects should not be named on arrest. Critics likened the policy to a totalitarian state where people can be swept off the streets without anyone being
