Harassment - crime prevention advice and evidence preservation
Harassment
Being a victim of crime can be an upsetting and traumatic experience, Nottinghamshire Police take all reports of harassment seriously.
Harassment is repeated, unwanted contact, which causes you alarm, or distress.
What happens next?
An officer will attend and speak to you about your report. Your report will be dealt with sensitively and if the harassment amounts to domestic abuse you will be asked questions to complete a risk assessment. This ensures risks are properly identified to effectively safeguard you.
Evidence Preservation
What you can do:
- If stalking takes place online or over the phone, it is important to save copies of any contact made
- It would be safer and also evidentially advisable for you to silence contact, rather than block the contact
- If a crime has been identified the officer will ask you to provide a statement, the statement gives best evidence to support a prosecution
- You will be offered the opportunity to provide a Victim Personal Statement (VPS) which is your opportunity to explain how the harassment has affected you
Crime Prevention
What you can do:
There are some steps you can do to protect yourself from harassment, these include:
- Reporting harassment over social media to the respective service provider
- Tell the person who is harassing you that their conduct is unwanted and causing you distress
- Do not engage in ongoing contact with the person who is harassing you
- Ideally do not block them from contacting you but keep a diary to log all contacts to help us show a course of conduct (which means it’s happened more than once)
SUPPORT FOR YOU - Further support and advice can be obtained from:
Tips to prevent stalking and harassment - Nottinghamshire Police website
The Cyber Helpline website
Nottinghamshire Victim Support website
Support for you
You can contact Nottinghamshire Victim Care if you have been affected by crime on 0800 304 7575 or via their website.
Contact us:
You can find information on The Code of Practice for Victims and Crime at The Code of Practice for Victims of Crime in England and Wales and supporting public information materials on the GOV.UK website.
Download
For a PDF version of the above information please click the below link.