Risk assessments
A risk assessment sets out the factors associated with future harm in a particular person and particular circumstances, how those factors interact, and what would change them. It describes risk; it does not forecast events.
Report scope
What this report is for
Assessments are normally built on structured professional judgement instruments rather than on unaided clinical impression. The instrument used depends on the question – violence, sexual offending, intimate partner violence and stalking each have their own established tools.
The report distinguishes static factors, which do not change, from dynamic factors, which can. It is the dynamic factors that carry the practical weight, because they are what management and treatment can act on.
These reports are prepared for Parole Board proceedings, sentencing, multi-agency public protection arrangements, mental health tribunals and, in some matters, immigration and family proceedings.
The precise remit, documents and assumptions should be settled in the letter of instruction. An expert’s opinion is confined to their own discipline and the material provided.
Instruction requirements
A focused route to usable evidence
The question asked shapes the instrument and the instrument shapes the report. A risk assessment prepared for one forum does not automatically answer the question another forum is asking.
The risk in question
Identify the specific harm the assessment is to address.
Full history
Provide index offence material, previous convictions and clinical records.
Current circumstances
Placement, supervision and treatment all bear on dynamic factors.
Independent opinion
The expert’s duty to the court is unaffected by who instructs.
Use the register to identify a suitable discipline, then agree the scope directly.
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Where this report sits
fitness to plead reports and capacity assessments address different questions about the same person and are sometimes commissioned alongside a risk assessment.
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